Pork & Apple Sausage Rolls

I’m back from my trip to America and strangely I loved the food! However we rarely strayed from places highly recommended - both through people we were staying with / the internet. The downside of American food I did return from my holiday with mild twitching and nausea from a reduced sugar intake. This is an embellishment but their food is high in sugar, for example their idea of a country loaf is brioche and some of their pizzas are Bostock with peperoni! So, in no way inspired from my foodie adventure in the states, I have made something terribly British in the form of sausage rolls. Some say the eating of sausage rolls on a bank holiday was the 11^th commandment -all I know is that it should be.

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  What you need:

  
  

  • 500 g of pork mice
  • 1 onion
  • 1 British apple - I used a Bramley 
  • 2 cloves of garlic
  • Fresh sage leaves
  • 1 egg
  • 100 g of unsalted butter 
  • 50 g of brown sugar
  • 2-3 handfuls of bread crumbs
  • A batch of my hangry cook puff pastry (http://hangrycook.blogspot.co.uk/2014/02/puff-pastry.html)

  
  

  
  

  How to make it:

  
  

  1. Dice up the onion and garlic finely and soften over a low heat in a pan with some extra butter and a pinch of seasoning.
  2. While the onion is cooking make the apple sauce, which will be used both as a dip and a filling in the roll. Remove the core of the apple and cut into chunks. Add to a saucepan the chunks of apple, 50g brown sugar, 5 tbsp of water and 50 g of butter. Stir the mix often to stop burning!
  3. Once the onions have taken on a brown colour - after about 20 minutes of cooking- add in 6 large leaves of sage that you have very finely diced up. Continue cooking for a further minute or two stirring the sage into the onion. Take the pan off the heat and allow to cool.
  4. At this point the apple should be pretty much mush and ready so take it off the heat and cool. Also melt the last 50 g of butter and get that cooling as well.
  5. Once everything is cold put the meat in a large bowl, add in the melted butter, onion mix and half of the apple sauce, not forgetting to season the meat concoction you have made. To test if the meat is where you want it, in terms of seasoning at taste, mix it together with the flavourings and take a small amount. Fry that in a pan as a little burger and eat it. What do you think? Does it need more seasoning, apple sauce or sage? Then add to your liking.
  6. All that’s left is to roll out the pastry into a rectangle about £1 coin in thickness. Cut this into 2 smaller but identical rectangles and spoon the meat in sausage shapes onto one of the pastry sheets. Leave at least 2cm between each sausage and egg wash in between each one. Now lay on top of this the 2^nd pastry sheet – you made need to roll this slightly bigger to compensate for the filling. Press the pastry down between each roll to seal and cut each individual sausage roll.  I made 6 thick rolls in two batches. I put them in the fridge while I made the other rolls. Egg wash the rolls to ensure a final golden coating once cooked and score the top of the pastry in whatever pattern takes your fancy. Bake in a 180 degrees C oven until the pastry is crisp and golden – this took about 20 minutes for me. At this point take a roll out, chop it in half and inspect the meat to make sure it is cooked through.
  7. Cool and eat in a socially weird thing like a picnic.

  
  

  
  

  
  

Pizza

Everyone loves pizza; this is a global undisputable fact. Toppings can be tailored to your own personal liking but using your own favourite cured meat will always be a winner. Placing your dough in the fridge will allow for slow fermentation which will lead to dough that’s easier to roll out and has a tastier crust. A word on crust - don’t be tight with topping, put the sauce to the edges, there is nothing worse than a 3 inch deep circumference of just bread. But there is a fine line between being generous with topping and overloading a pizza. Too much topping will lead to soggy pizza, raw dough and no crisp base.

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  What you need:
  

  • ½ batch of The hangry Cook bread dough (click "bread dough" to go to the recipe) 
  • 2 tins of chopped tomatoes 
  • Fresh rosemary sprigs
  • Fresh thyme sprigs
  • 2 mozzarella balls
  • Mushrooms, thinly sliced
  • 80g charcuterie meat, sliced – the best quality you can afford. I used a chilli and black pepper salami made locally in Leeds.

  • Several baking trays or a pizza stone
  • Semolina

  
  

  How to make it:
  

  1. Firstly mix your bread dough and leave to prove for an hour. Alternatively you can make the dough up to 2 days in advance and leave it in the fridge before using it – this will make the dough easier to roll out and more importantly even tastier.
  2. Put the chopped tomatoes into a saucepan with the rosemary and thyme. Simmer for about 20 minutes until the sauce thickens. If the tomatoes are a little bitter tasting add a splash balsamic vinegar.  Leave to cool.
  3. Turn the oven on to 220 ˚C.
  4. Taking 100g of dough, flour your work surface and the top of the dough. Use a rolling pin to roll out the dough, turning it every quarter to ensure you end up with a circle. Of course adapt this method to suit the shape of your baking tray if necessary. Once the dough is thin (about 12-14inches in diameter) sprinkle your baking tray or pizza stone with semolina, to stop the pizza sticking, and place your dough onto it.
  5. Spread a very thin layer of the tomato sauce onto the dough – remember it is a very thin base and can’t hold too much topping so less is more. Then scatter some slices of mozzarella, mushrooms and the cured meat on top of the sauce. Again don’t overload the pizza with toppings as more toppings equal more water and ultimately a soggy pizza base - you want a cooked, crisp base.
  6.  Bake for 8 minutes in the hot oven, turning half way through if necessary.
  7. Slide onto a large board, cut into slices and stuff your face.

  
  

Spiced Battered Fish

This dish is primarily a result of visiting the fishmongers later in the day and the only thing available was cod and turbot. With me not being so flash with cash I chose the cod.  I was thinking about doing regular fried fish and chips but I thought, in the heat wave we have being experiencing, adding some spice would make it feel less greasy and sickly. I’m glad to say it worked and all it needs is some mushy peas and thickly buttered bread. That’s right I made a fish butty and mushy peas.

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  What you need:

  
  

  • 4 small cod fillets – get your fishmonger to fillet them for you if buying whole
  • 1 tsp cumin
  • 1 tsp coriander
  • ½ tsp turmeric
  • ½ tsp garlic powder
  • ½ tsp ground ginger
  • Fresh chilli, finely chopped
  • Fresh coriander, finely chopped
  • 1 lime
  • 100g plain flour
  • Sparkling water

  
  

  How to make it:

  
  

  1. Firstly, make sure that there are no stray bones left in your cod fillets, using a clean pair of tweezers to remove any stragglers. 
  2. Measure out all of the spices into a ramekin and sprinkle over both sides of the fillets. Squeeze over the juice of a lime. Leave these to marinade whilst making the batter. Same some spice for you batter.
  3. I chose to make a tempura style batter – mix the plain flour with salt and pepper, chopped fresh chilli coriander, a pinch of your spice mix and enough of the sparkling water to make a batter with a consistency similar to a Yorkshire pudding mix. The sparkling water will make the batter lighter but using normal water will work just fine.
  4. Fill a heavy based pan half way with vegetable oil (or use a deep fat fryer if you have one- unfortunately I don’t have the space for one currently) and put on a moderate to high heat. To check that the oil is hot enough drop a small amount of the batter in – it should immediately start intensely bubbling in the oil.
  5. Put some extra seasoned plain flour onto a plate and coat both sides of the cod fillets in the flour. This will ensure that the batter clings to the fish allowing the fish to steam within its crispy coating. Take each floured fillet and dip into the batter ensuring it is fully coated. Carefully, holding the thin end of the fillet, lower the fish into the oil and move it along the surface of the oil – this will ensure that the batter starts to cook and doesn’t stick to the bottom of the pan. If you are using a deep fat fryer use this same technique – DO NOT place the fish in the basket and lower it into the oil as you will end up with a battered basket and some greasy cod. I cooked the fish in two batches to ensure the temperature of the oil didn’t drop. Fry for approximately 3 minutes until the batter is golden brown. Then carefully flip the fish and again fry for roughly 3 minutes until golden. Remove from the oil allowing the oil to drain off back into the pan and place on some kitchen roll to absorb any excess oil. 
  6. Serve up with the aforementioned buttered bread and homemade mushy peas.