Kangaroo, salsa verde and chilli sausage rolls

Give your sausage rolls a bit of a 'gourmet' treatment by pairing kangaroo mince with salsa verde. Encased in shortcrust pastry, these meaty parcels are wonderfully moist and more-ish. The salsa is one for your repertoire, too. If you're not in the mood for sausage rolls, serve the herb and caper mixture atop chargrilled meat, roasted potatoes or a simple salad.

Classic with a twist: kangaroo and chilli sausage rolls Credit: Gourmet Game

• makes

  32

• prep

  30 minutes

• cook

  25 minutes

• difficulty

  Easy

Ingredients

• 445 g ready-made frozen sour cream shortcrust pastry, thawed
• 500 g kangaroo mince
• ⅕ cup fresh breadcrumbs
• 1 egg, lightly beaten
• sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
• 1 egg (extra), for glaze

Salsa verde

• 2 tsp baby salted capers, rinsed
• 4 baby cornichons, chopped
• 1 anchovy fillets (optional)
• 1 clove garlic, crushed
• 1 long red chilli (optional), de-seeded
• 1 tsp Dijon mustard
• 1 tbsp each of chopped dill, basil, mint and parsley
• 1 tbsp lemon juice
• ½ tsp finely grated lemon zest
• freshly ground black pepper

Chilling time 30 minutes

Instructions

Preheat oven to 200°C (180°C fan-forced) and lightly grease baking trays and line with baking paper.

To make the salsa verde, place all the ingredients in a food processor and process until smooth, then add the kangaroo mince, breadcrumbs, egg, salt and pepper, pulsing until well combined. 

Place pastry sheet on a lightly floured work surface and halve lengthways, to create two equal sized rectangles. Roll each rectangle widthways to approximately 18 cm x 25 cm. 

Evenly divide the kangaroo mixture in half, shape like a sausage, placing down the centre of each pastry rectangle; making sure that the pastry is able to encase the mixture. Firmly bring one long side of the pastry up against the sausage meat and lightly brush what will be the seam with the egg glaze. Repeat with the other side by firmly bringing the remaining pastry up and over the glazed pastry, creating a seal. This will be pretty tight and there should ideally be about a 1 cm overlap.  

Place sausage rolls on prepared baking tray (seam side down) and chill for at least 30 minutes. Cut each large sausage into eight small sausage rolls, snip the top three times with a pair of scissors and brush the outside pastry with the egg glaze. Evenly spread out the sausage rolls onto prepared baking trays. 

Place in preheated oven, cook for 25-30 minutes or until pastry is crisp and cooked through. Allow sausage rolls to cool slightly before serving.

Recipe and photograhy from Gourmet Game. 

Cook's Notes

Oven temperatures are for conventional; if using fan-forced (convection), reduce the temperature by 20˚C. | We use Australian tablespoons and cups: 1 teaspoon equals 5 ml; 1 tablespoon equals 20 ml; 1 cup equals 250 ml. | All herbs are fresh (unless specified) and cups are lightly packed. | All vegetables are medium size and peeled, unless specified. | All eggs are 55-60 g, unless specified.