I found the secret to the ultimate sausage roll

It's what the trendy bakeries don't want you to know.

I have a go-to sausage roll recipe that I’ve been making for 15+ years, but there’s part of me that has always wondered how the trendy bakeries make their $8 kind.

You know, the ones encased in golden flaky pastry that’s soft and pillowy on top but crispy and caramelised underneath. And the filling that’s umami and moist and…

It’s safe to say sausage rolls are never far from my mind. At 11pm on a recent family camping trip, we were chatting about food. While describing in detail our all-time favourite foods (as you do at almost midnight), my cousin described the sausage roll he eats at least once a week. He said it’s rich, not too meaty and “unlike any other” he has tried before.

Luckily, this cousin also happens to work at the bakery that makes them – and it’s famous for its sausage rolls. 

Ingredients to add to sausage rolls

Casually, my cousin revealed that the secret ingredient in their sausage rolls is cream. Yep, a whole heap of cream is added into the meat mixture. No wonder they’re so rich, moist and moreish.

This bombshell led to a whole heap of digging through our sausage roll recipes (like I said, I think about them a LOT), and it turns out Curtis Stone has been doing it for years! In his lamb sausage rolls recipe, he mixes something surprising into the breadcrumb mix. 

Curtis Stone’s secret sausage roll ingredient

You might be surprised to discover his clever addition to his sausage roll filling mixture is… CREAM! My first thought was that it would make the filling lose its umami flavour, but that it would also leave my sausage rolls at risk of getting soggy bottoms or, worse than that, falling apart!

But our foodies say that the addition of cream is not as crazy as it sounds…

Why add cream to sausage rolls?

I asked our food editors about Curtis’ bakery trick and they confirmed that cream softens the breadcrumbs and stops the meat mixture from drying out, as the breadcrumbs won’t suck up moisture from the meat and other ingredients. 

Taste‘s Food Director Michelle Southan explained: “No need for dry sausage rolls, as the addition of cream adds extra moisture keeping them soft and juicy.”

It doesn’t stop there, Curtis also uses the cream to brush the tops of the pastry, achieving  that glazed, golden, bakery-style crust. We’ve heard of people using everything from milk to egg to buttermilk to do this for extra gloss, so it makes lots of sense. 

Curtis Stone, you’ve unlocked the secret to next-level sausage rolls!

And this is the only way I’ll be making sausage rolls from now on.

Originally published as I found the secret to the ultimate sausage roll