Toad in the Hole with Onion Gravy

Ingredients

• 8 sausage
• 150 g wheat flour
• 3 egg
• 2½ dl milk
• 3 tbsp vegetable oil
• 2 onion, halved and thinly sliced
• 4 dl beef stock
• 1 tsp Dijon mustard
• 1 tbsp fresh thyme, leaves picked
• 20 g butter
• 1 tbsp cornstarch
• ½ tsp white sugar
• 1 tsp salt
• ½ tsp black pepper

Method

1. 1.

   Whisk and rest the batter — Whisk the flour with half the salt, beat in the eggs to a stiff paste, then let the milk down into it a splash at a time so no lumps form. You want a smooth batter about the thickness of single cream. Rest it at room temperature for 15 minutes.

2. 2.

   Roast the sausages in hot oil — Heat the oven to 220°C. Pour the oil into a metal roasting tin of about 20 x 30 cm, add the sausages and roast for 15 minutes, turning them once, until the oil is shimmering hot and the sausages have taken good colour.

3. 3.

   Bake the pudding tall — Pull the tin out, pour the batter around the sausages in one confident movement — it should hiss the moment it hits the fat — and slide it straight back in. Bake 28 to 30 minutes without opening the door, until the batter has climbed the sides of the tin and is deep gold and crisp.

4. 4.

   Caramelise the onions — Meanwhile melt the butter in a heavy frying pan and add the onions, sugar, thyme and a pinch of salt. Cook over low heat for 20 minutes, stirring every few minutes and scraping the brown film off the base, until the onions are soft, sticky and genuinely dark — pale onions make thin gravy.

5. 5.

   Thicken the gravy — Pour in the beef stock, stir in the mustard and bring to a simmer. Slake the cornstarch in a tablespoon of cold water, stir it in and simmer for 5 minutes until the gravy coats the back of a spoon. Season with the black pepper and the last of the salt.

6. 6.

   Serve before it deflates — Cut the pudding into four squares, each with two sausages, and serve straight from the tin with the onion gravy poured generously over the top. It deflates fast, so get it to the table the moment it comes out.