Shop 7/52-56 Gladesville Rd, Hunters Hill, New South Wales
stonegroundbakery.com.au

On a grey and rainy Saturday Mrs Snot Block & Roll decided we could use a nice warming lunch at a bakery-cafe somewhere. I checked Google Maps to see if I could find somewhere promising and new within a short drive, and located Stoneground Bakery in a suburb acceptably far from home. Online reviews seemed positive, and the website offered various pies and other goodies.

So we drove over through the gentle drizzle and were fortunate to find a vacant table on the footpath outside, but under cover of the awning, where we could sit with Canine Snot Block & Roll while we inspected the wares and then ordered some lunch.

They had a few varieties of meat pies and a sausage roll on the menu, and they looked good in the hot display cabinet. Alas there was no vanilla slice, so I got a chocolate caramel tart instead. We also bought a loaf of sourdough bread to take home to have with dinner in the evening.

The sausage roll looks well cooked, with the pastry a dark golden brown colour, and the seared meat filling on the end looks promising. Large flakes are crumbling and threatening to fall off the pastry, so that’s a promising sign for the texture. It may perhaps be a touch overdone, but the taste test will tell.

There’s a distinctive taste of sweetness on the first bite, which I suspect comes from the many fine slivers of what appears to be carrot throughout the filing. The pastry is very crisp and flaky, with a good amount of butteriness but not overwhelmingly greasy. The pastry is really good, and no hint of sogginess. But the filling has both an odd flavour and texture – it’s a bit mealy, with the meat incredibly finely minced, or chopped – almost like pulled pork in texture but on a micro scale. It’s barely moist enough – it’s not dry as such, but could do with a bit more juiciness. It’s has a strange and unusal flavour, like an Asian dish with elements of both sweetness and then sourness coming through. It’s really not like a traditional sausage roll filling at all. It’s not terrible, but it’s not great either, and a little weird.

Overall, it’s edible and not really bad in any way, but more unexpected and unsatisfying.

Sausage roll: 5/10