Sausage Cups

Savory Italian sausage balls nestled in buttery puff pastry cups.

My next door neighbor is from England and every Christmas she makes little goodies she grew up eating, one of which is bangers rolled in puff pastry. We don’t exchange gifts, just platters of yummy sweets and appetizers, so we look forward to her rolls. The sausage rolls are easy enough to make myself, but there’s something special about their connection to the holidays and seeing my friend at my door with a plate of them.

My two daughters love them too, so I wait for them to come over and I heat them up. Then we sit around the warm kitchen, chat and eat and sigh over their deliciousness.

With the holidays around the corner, I thought I do my version of sausage rolls, which are different than my friend’s, so it doesn’t diminish the specialness of hers. And these are almost effortless to make. With just two ingredients, they’re a snap to make into little cups, and you want something like that when you’re preparing holiday foods for a party.

The Italian sausage I used is salty, savory, and full of flavor, so eating these by themselves is perfect. But my family also smeared a bit of gourmet beer mustard on it and that added a bit more complexity to the flavors. Of course, the grandkids looked at the mustard and said it wasn’t real mustard…you know, the yellow kind…and opted for plain sausage cups.

Makes 2 dozen

• 1 package puff pastry, thawed
• 16 oz. package of Italian sausage (regular, sweet or hot)
• Mini muffin tin
• 3-inch round cookie cutter

When you lay flat one piece of puff pastry, there will be three sections. Roll out the sheet of the puff pastry to little over 12 inches length-wise, so four 3-inch rounds can be cut out of each section.  Push the rounds into the mini muffin tin.

​Squeeze out the sausage from the casing and roll into balls. Place a ball into the center of each pastry cup. Press the edges of the pastry so it’s level with the tin. Edges will rise as it bakes.

Bake at 400 degrees for about 13 minutes or until crust is golden brown. Do not over bake as the bottoms will burn. If some sides of the cups rise higher and lopsided, you can gently press it down as soon as it comes out of the oven, or leave it as such.

Serve warm with or without gourmet mustards. They can be reheated in the microwave.