Pork-chop sausage rolls

These happened by accident, I had a pork chop in the fridge but it wasn't going to be enough for the farmer and me to have for tea so I had to think of a way of making it stretch a little further. The farmer loves sausage rolls so I thought why not give them a try with diced pork chop instead of pork mince. We have found a winner here my friends, tasty and didn't take long. One chop made two rolls the width of my oven tray which meant not only did it stretch for dinner, there was a couple left for the farmer's lunch the next day! These would be great to wheel out for any time you need to feed extras.

INGREDIENTS:

• 1 large pork chop 
• 1 onion
• 1 small leek
• 1 Tblsp olive oil
• 2 slices bread (no crusts)
• 2 Tblsp milk
• 2 Tblsp chopped parsley
• cracked black pepper
• salt to taste
• 3 eggs
• two sheets rolled out puff pastry
• 1 Tblsp sesame seeds

METHOD:

Preheat the oven to 190 degrees Celsius. Line a baking tray with baking paper.
Chop the onion and leek very finely. Cook  the onion and leek in the olive oil at a medium heat for about three minutes until softened. Set aside to cool.
Roughly chop the bread and place in a bowl. Pour over the milk and leave for 2-3 minutes. Mix the bread around so that there is no excess liquid. While that is soaking, take your chop and cut all the meat from the bone. Chop this as finely as you can so it looks like coarse mince. Now add the chopped pork, onion, leek, parsley, pepper, salt and two eggs to the bread in your bowl.
Mix with your hands until it is all combined (make sure your hands are clean!).
Take you two sheets of pastry, lay them out and arrange half of the mixture on each sheet in a sausage shape along the edge closest to you. Take your third egg and beat it up in a cup, use this to brush the far away edge of the pastry so that it will stick shut. Now roll up and press to secure. Repeat with both sheets.
Now you can choose whether you cut the rolls up at this point or bake as one big sausage and cut up after cooking ( I cut it up after but either if fine, before cooking is less messy because you don't get pastry flakes everywhere). Place your rolls seam side down on a baking tray and brush with the remaining egg. Sprinkle with sesame seeds and bake for 15-20 minutes or until golden and puffed.
Serve with tomato sauce.

TIPS:

• you don't have to use a pork chop, mince would probably work better but the whole thing behind this recipe discovery was that I had a chop- so I used it.
• You could add other veges to the filling if you chose
• 1/4 of an apple cut really finely and added to the mixture would also be yum

Enjoy xx
A

Mrs Renshaw's Plum sauce recipe

I was lucky enough to get this recipe from my friend George's mum. George always has this awesome plum sauce in his cupboard and so because rich juicy plums are in abundance right now in Geraldine, I got him to ask his mum for the recipe-which I am now sharing with all of you. This stuff is good enough to eat right off the spoon, so go out, pick some plums and get bottling!

INGREDIENTS:

• 3 lbs ripe plums (wash cut and destone)
• 1 1/2 lbs brown sugar
• 1 1/4 pints of vinegar
• 1/4 pint water
• 3 small tsp salt
• 1 tsp ground ginger
• 1 tsp pepper
• 1 tsp ground cloves
• 1/4 tsp cayenne pepper
• 1 onion chopped finely
• 4 cloves chopped garlic

METHOD:
Put all of the ingredients into a large pot and boil for two hours. Let cool and then blend in the food processor to make smooth (if you choose- it may be smooth enough after boiling) and bottle into sterilised glass bottles.

TIPS:

• 1/4 pint is about 1/2 a cup
• This sauce is a perfect excuse to recycle old spirit and wine bottles with a screw on cap.

Thanks Mrs Renshaw
Enjoy xx
A