Description
This gorgeous Christmas sausage roll wreath is such a showstopping appetizer for the holiday season. It’s easy, takes only 10 minutes to prep and is stuffed with festive cranberries and pecans.
Ingredients
- 400g/14oz sausages (use your favourite, good quality, free-range sausages)
- ½ cup dried cranberries
- ¼ cup pecans
- ¼ cup flaked almonds
- ½ teaspoon salt
- Black pepper
- 1 sheet ready rolled puff pastry
- 1 cup cranberry sauce
- 1 egg, whisked
- 1 tablespoon sesame seeds (optional)
Instructions
- Make the sausage mix. Heat your oven to 180C/360F fan and get a large oven tray ready. Roughly chop the cranberries, pecans and almonds, then get them into a large mixing bowl. Slice through the sausage casings, and squeeze the sausage meat out into the bowl. Add ½ teaspoon of salt and a grind of black pepper, then mix well until everything is combined.
- Form the sausage roll. Lay out a large piece of baking paper on a flat surface, then place your sheet of puff pastry on it. Spoon 4 tablespoons of the cranberry sauce down the middle of the puff pastry, about 5cm/2 inches wide (lengthways, down the longest side). Pile the sausage meat mix onto the cranberry sauce line, in a long log shape. Try to keep this as equal as you can in terms of height and width.
- Roll up the sausage roll. Brush the whisked egg down one side of the pastry, next to the sausage log. Fold the un-egg-washed side over the sausage log, then keep rolling the log over the egg-washed side to seal the pastry. Keep rolling, then turn over so the seam of the pastry is at the bottom of one very long sausage roll.
- Form the wreath. Mark 11 roughly equal lines down the sausage roll, then cut two-thirds of the way through the roll (leave ⅓ uncut at the top of the rolls, so the wreath stays together). Carefully join the two exposed ends to form a circle – brush the pastry with a little more eggwash to help it stick. Very carefully twist each sausage roll over a quarter, so the exposed sausage meat is facing up. Brush the exposed pastry with the rest of the egg wash, then scatter the top of the rolls with the sesame seeds if you’re using them.
- Bake and serve. Transfer the wreath on the baking paper to the oven tray, then place it in the oven and bake for about 50 minutes, until the pastry is super golden, puffed up and the sausage meat looks firm and is starting to look golden. Serve with the rest of the cranberry sauce in the middle of the wreath, for dipping.
Notes
PREP AHEAD: Form the wreath and then refrigerate it, covered, a day ahead of time, then just bake it when you’re ready. You can also freeze the uncooked wreath and bake it from frozen – up the cooking time to 1 hour in this case.
SUBSTITUTION: Swap the dried cranberries for apricots, and the pecans and almonds for pistachios, walnuts or cashews, or leave them out altogether. I like to throw in a handful of chopped sage leaves sometimes, for more festive flavour. Instead of cranberry sauce, you can use any chutney, relish or sauce you like! A caramelized onion chutney would be lovely, and I’ve used my favourite chilli jam and fig and tamarind chutney before.
- Prep Time: 10
- Cook Time: 50
- Category: snacks
- Method: oven
- Cuisine: british
Nutrition
- Serving Size: 1 roll
- Calories: 306
- Sugar: 2.2g
- Sodium: 419mg
- Fat: 22.8g
- Saturated Fat: 6g
- Carbohydrates: 15.6g
- Fiber: 1.2g
- Protein: 9.6g
- Cholesterol: 42mg
Keywords: sausage rolls, christmas sausage rolls, easy sausage rolls