Toad In A Hole

Note: ignore this line – purely for claiming my blog on technorati purposes – DVQT6JKUY72H

“Had the best toad in the hole tonight… even though the toad had nearly jumped out the hole it tasted fantastic.” The Pom tweeted.

When comes to Yorkshire pudding, no one can be a better judge than the Pom himself, who grew up in Northamptonshire, UK, eating this stuff. Your capability of English cooking will be judged by how good your yorkshire pudding is. I am very glad that I finally received the seal of approval of these Toad In A Hole that I made recently, even though the Pom thinks they look phallic…

Maybe…

Just a little…

Ok.. ok… they do look a little phallic.

Toad in the hole, is a traditional English dish with sausages “hidden” in the puffy yorkshire pudding. However, in Australia, the toad in the hole is also known as the common breakfast meal where a hole is cut from the bread and then fry an egg inside -> like this. Well, that version wouldn’t be much of a challenge comparing to the English version which absolutely needs a brave soul to attempt the recipe. The recipe itself is actually quite easy, but is the initial step of handling hot oil that scares me.

My first attempt is an absolute fail. To make a puffy yorkshire pudding, who doesn’t know that duck fat or oil that can heat up to a very high temperature are normally called for. I had neither of those and used olive oil (~ that’s how stupid I was and being optimistic ~) which didn’t heat up very well and no doubt the pudding came out flat, stodgy, and chewy like a an inch thick pancake. Another thing I found is using 6-hole muffin tin works much better than the normal baking tray because of its smaller volume on each muffin hole and it cooks quicker and evenly. So what you get is six individual portion size of yorkshire pudding muffins… with toad in it.

I used the short chipolata as the “toad” so that when the yorkshire pudding puffs up, the sausage doesn’t get pushed out as much. If you are using a normal long sausages, then I suggest you to cut in half before putting into the muffin tin. And for the yorkshire pudding itself, I also added lemon thyme into the mix to give it an extra herby flavour. Whisk up a simple gravy, there you have it a scrumptious dinner for two.

Toad in a hole

Ingredients:
6 chipolatas (or sausages cut in half)
1 cup flour
1 cup full cream milk
1 pinch salt
A handful of lemon thyme
2 eggs
Vegetable oil (or duck fat)

Methods:
1. Preheat oven to 220C (It needs to be hot)

2. Quickly pan fry the sausages until almost cooked. Slice in half if is long. Set aside.

3. Pour 2 tablespoon of vegetable oil into a 6-hole muffin tin and heat it up in the oven. Takes about 10-15mins.

4. While the oil is heating up in the oven, work on the pudding batter. Add flour, milk, salt, lemon thyme, eggs into mixing bowl and mix well together until becomes a think batter mix.

5. Take the muffin tin with VERY HOT oil out of the oven CAREFULLY and steadily. Works quickly, put the sausages in each hole, and pour the mix batter into each hole until 3/4 full.

6. Put it back in the oven and bake for 20mins or until golden brown.

7. The yorkshire pudding will deflate a little once cool down, so serve it when is hot!

Tagged as: cooking, english, i cooked this, recipe, sausage, toad in a hole, yorkshire pudding