Tony’s Baked Sausages
This is a 'toad-in-the-hole' of epic flavour. When I was growing up, my mum used to make this for tea but it was never called 'toad-in-the-hole'. So when I was having tea at a friend's house one afternoon, I was so excited when he told me we were having this exotic-and-weird-sounding dish called 'toad-in-the-hole'.
How deflated was I when it was just baked sausages... When I got home I had words with my mum, asking her to explain why it wasn't called that in our family. The only explanation I got was that the name made her squeamish - as if we would ever have had toads in the house!
Serves 6
Ingredients
Rapeseed oil
50g butter
8 large good-quality pork sausages
8 fresh thyme sprigs
2 Russet apples, peeled cored and cut into chunks
1 Bramley apple, peeled, cored and cut into chunks half the size of the Russet ones
2 tbsp chopped parsley, to garnish batter
3 eggs
280ml full-fat milk
100g plain flour, sifted
pinch of salt
Gravy Ingredients
Splash of vegetable oil
3 garlic cloves, peeled and crushed
250g Spanish onions, peeled and sliced
Salt and pepper
1 tbsp treacle
3 tbsp Worcestershire sauce
600ml ale of your choice (I would use Eighty Shilling or any good brown ale)
600ml strong chicken stock, or chicken stock cube(s) dissolved in 600ml water
4- 6 large portabello mushrooms, sliced
1½ tsp cornflour mixed with 3 tbsp cold water
Instructions
Preheat the oven to 200°C/gas 6. Mix the batter ingredients together and put in the fridge.
Pour 1cm rapeseed oil into a 20 x 25cm baking tin, then place this on the middle shelf of your oven. Place tin foil on the shelf below to catch any oil or batter that comes over the top.
Put a splash of oil in a heavy-based frying pan and when it is hot add the butter and brown the sausages all over then take them out of the pan. Take the tin out of the oven - the oil should be smoking - and place your sausages, thyme and apple in it. Carefully pour over the batter; it will bubble and possibly even spit a little, so be careful. Gently put the tin back in the oven and bake for 25-30 minutes. Don't open the door for at least 20 minutes, so as not to ruin the batter - it can be a bit temperamental when rising. Remove from the oven when golden and crisp.
For the gravy, heat a film of oil in a heavy-based pan and fry the garlic and onion till soft. Add salt and pepper and turn up the heat. As soon as the onions take on some colour, add the treacle and Worcestershire and cook for 5 minutes, stirring all the time. Add the beer and bubble until reduced to a syrup, then add the stock, bring to the boil and add the mushrooms. Reduce to a simmer and reduce by half then stir in the cornflour mixture and bring to boil. Season and serve with the sausages.
Enjoy!! And make sure to tag @McTSingh in photos of your Baked Sausages on social media! 📷