No British gathering, from a child's birthday party to a cricket tea, is complete without a plate of sausage rolls. They are exactly what they sound like: well seasoned sausage meat rolled in buttery pastry and baked, then cut into lengths that fit a hand and a mouth in roughly equal proportion. Bakery chains sell them by the million, and their recipes are the subject of the kind of loyalty usually reserved for football teams.

The homemade version beats them all and takes very little skill, especially with ready rolled all butter puff pastry, which professional cooks use without embarrassment. Silverstone's campsites on race weekend run largely on sausage rolls and tea; bake a batch the day before and they travel in a tin perfectly.

The filling

Ingredients

• 1 tablespoon (15 g) butter or oil
• 1 medium onion
• 1 lb (450 g) pork sausage meat
• 1/2 cup (30 g) fresh white breadcrumbs
• 1 tablespoon fresh sage
• 1 teaspoon fresh thyme leaves
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon black pepper
• 1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg or mace
• 1 teaspoon English or Dijon mustard

Wrapping and baking

Ingredients

• 1 lb (450 g) all butter puff pastry
• 1 large egg
• 1 teaspoon fennel or sesame seeds
• a little flour

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