Mediterranean Sausage Plait

First, pre-heat the oven to 200°C (Gas Mark 6). Grease a baking sheet lightly with oil, then line it with baking paper. Next, snip off one end of 4-5 of your sausages (you will need 400g of sausage meat) and squeeze the meat out into a large bowl. Pat the red pepper dry, then chop it finely and add it to the bowl. Thinly slice the olives and add them to the bowl, together with the tomato purée and a good grinding of black pepper. Break the egg into a small bowl and beat it briefly, then reserve two tbsp for glazing the Plait and tip the rest of the egg into the bowl with the sausage meat, pepper, olives and tomato puree. Mix all the ingredients together until well combined.

Sprinkle a little flour on a clean work surface, then roll out the puff pastry into a square of about 30cm x 30cm. Carefully lift the pastry on to the prepared baking tray, then put the sausage filling in a straight line down the middle of the pastry, leaving a couple of centimetres empty at the top and bottom. Now comes the fiddly bit; working at either side of the sausage meat, cut 2cm strips on a slight diagonal all the way down the pastry. You want to make sure the strips are all the same width and that the number of strips is the same on both sides of the filling (you will probably get 10-12 strips, depending on the size of your pastry square).

Use some of the reserved beaten egg to brush the pastry all over, then fold the empty top and bottom pieces of pastry up over the filling. Working from the top down, fold a pastry strip across the filling from the left-hand side, then bring a strip across from the right, crossing the previous strip (a bit like plaiting). Repeat until you have taken all the strips from both sides, tucking them in as neatly as you can at the bottom, and brush the Plait all over with the remaining egg. Put the Plait into the hot oven and cook for about 35 minutes, or until the pastry is golden brown. Serve hot or cold.