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Sausage Rolls

Sausage rolls are baked paste filled with minced meat, onion, herbs, and bread.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Thyme and marjoram match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,225 recipes. Both carry terpineol, which smells pine, woody. The science ↓

Sausage Rolls

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the pastry

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. In a bowl, combine the dripping and flour, rubbing them together until sandy.

  3. Add a pinch of salt and mix with cold water to form a firm paste.

  4. Roll out the paste to ½ inch thickness.

Make the filling

  1. In a separate bowl, mix the minced meat, onion, herbs, pepper, and salt.

  2. Combine the squeezed bread with the meat mixture thoroughly.

  3. Shape the mixture into sausages and place them on the rolled‑out paste.

Assemble and bake

  1. Wet the edges of the paste and fold over to seal, ensuring all are the same size.

  2. Bake for 30 minutes.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Thyme + marjoramtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: terpineol (pine, woody).

  2. Marjoram + peppertop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,609 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  3. Thyme + peppertop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,585 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  4. Onion + thymetop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,171 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  5. Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Flour
Forms the structure of the pastry that encloses the filling.
Dripping or lard
Adds fat that makes the pastry short and tender when rubbed into flour.
Cold meat
Provides the main savoury body and flavour of the filling.
Soaked bread
Adds moisture and binds the filling so it stays juicy.
Onion
Adds sweetness and aroma to the filling.

The step that matters

Keeping the pastry cold and the paste firm. Cold fat rubbed into flour and cold water keep the fat in small pieces, which gives a flaky, tender pastry. Warm fat melts into the flour and makes the paste greasy and tough.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (meat, thyme, marjoram, bread, pepper, flour):

  1. Shallotfits better
  2. Carrotfits better
  3. Leekfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against meat, thyme, marjoram, bread, pepper, flour. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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