Cheesy Sausage Rolls – Fast Kid-Friendly Dinner Idea for Camping Trips or Back to School!

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This is a sponsored conversation written by me on behalf of Johnsonville. The opinions and text are all mine.

Cheesy Sausage Rolls 

It’s hard to believe that summertime is over & we’re back full steam ahead in the busy back to school season. Our family we went on several camping trips this summer, right up until Labor Day weekend. My husband and I used to camp regularly before we had kids, but since having kids, we only have camped a few times when they were younger. That is until we took our girls camping last Labor Day weekend and they raved so much about it & how much they loved it, that we knew we needed to make it more of a priority this summer.

What we love most about camping is how relaxing it can be just sitting around the campfire & spending time together in the outdoors. Camping is definitely work in preparing, setting up & cleaning up (especially if you are tent camping like we do), but while you’re there, you just want to keep things easy & simple to keep that relaxed, low-key atmosphere which is why so many of us love to camp.

So, we are all about finding meals that are delicious & filling yet simple enough to put together ahead of time or quick to assemble while at camp. When we first started to camp years ago, we’d eat very simple meals & a lot of canned foods, but now we realize there are options out there for more flavorful meals without having to sacrifice simplicity or the time in preparing those meals.

These Cheesy Sausage Rolls are a family favorite since they are so simple & easy to put together as you can make these in 10 minutes or less, plus they are very  kid friendly as kids love fun, unique ways of eating food.  Even the young kids can hold these rolls very easily , with all the extra toppings added inside, so they are almost mess-free, which is always a plus when you’re camping & may not have access to as many showers or water.

I love to use Johnsonville Fully Cooked and Smoked Sausages inside of these rolls because Johnsonville uses only the premium cuts of pork with no fillers, so I know they are good quality, tasty & flavorful. With the variety of options they have now for sausages/brats, there are so many to satisfy everyone from the cheese lovers (like the Naturals White Cheddar Smoked Sausage variety) to the fans of a little spice & heat (like the New Orleans Spicy Smoked Sausage links or the Naturals: Jalapeno Cheddar Smoked Sausage links). You don’t need to use any extra ingredients or spices since they do offer such a wide variety of options, just add any toppings inside that you’d like & dipping sauces to finish off the meal.  They are so filling, too, which is always a necessity when you’re camping, so you don’t need a lot of extra food to serve with it besides some veggies or fruit & a side dish if you’d like.

Cheese Sausage Rolls:

These Cheese Sausage Rolls are a family favorite since they are so simple & easy to put together, especially using fully cooked and smoked Johnsonville sausages.  Put these together ahead of time to bring with you for a fast, ready-made meal you just need to heat up or assemble right at the campsite in 5 – 10 minutes.  Their simplicity & speed to assemble these also make them awesome meals for those busy back to school nights when you’re juggling various sports schedules & need to make a dinner that your family can grab & go on the way out the door!

Ingredients:

Frozen Bake & Serve Dinner Rolls (I like to use the Texas sized dinner dolls for the bigger size)

Johnsonville Sausages – I used the Smoked Brats, Beef Brats & Beddar Cheddar varieties (we love the Johnsonville Fully Cooked & Smoked Sausages for fast & flavorful sausages already cooked)

Shredded Cheese, as desired

Any toppings you prefer (onions, jalapeno peppers & more)

Any dipping sauces you prefer (ketchup, mustard, BBQ sauce & more)

Directions:

Thaw out your frozen dinner rolls until they are soft (they will also rise as you do this).

Take one roll (if you’re using the Texas sized rolls) or two rolls if they are regular size) & roll it out so it’s round & flat.

Put your Johnsonville sausage  in the middle.

Decide if you want any toppings for your sausage & add those before you seal up the dough. You can slit the sausage open & add cheese, onions, jalapenos, etc. Or add your toppings on top and all around the sausage.

When you are finished adding toppings, cover the sausage with the dough and seal it so the toppings won’t come out while cooking.

Cook the Cheese Sausage Rolls at 350 degrees for 15-20 minutes, just until the dough is a golden brown.

Serve with your favorite dipping sauces – ketchup, mustard, BBQ sauce and more!

If you’re rushing off to sports practices or events or other busy back to school activities, you could even put some of these dipping sauces in little condiment containers with lids (you can find these at the Costco business centers or Cash & Carry stores) and then you’d have a meal on the go that’s ready in 10 minutes or less! How’s that for easy for a busy school night?!

Directions for Making Cheese Sausage Rolls on Camping Trips:

I love the idea of bringing items that are fully cooked or at least meat that is fully cooked on camping trips. When you bring raw meat, you have to worry that you will have enough ice to keep everything from getting thawed & being unsafe to eat, so these Johnsonville Fully Cooked & Smoked sausages take away that worry & speed up the time you’d have to spend cooking them through, since you just have to reheat these over the fire or camp stove to warm them up.

These are great for the first night of a camping trip as you can make them ahead of time & just heat them up over the campfire or the camp stove.  These Cheese Sausage Rolls are an easy, fast, filling meal after a busy day of travel and getting your campsite set up. I am all about easy meals after doing all that hard work to get your campsite set up so you can just sit by the fire & eat these by hand. You can call them Campfire Rolls (or Dogs) for the kids as another fun name.

Pre-Cook:

The easiest way to make these for camping trips is to pre-cook them ahead of time & then warm them over the fire or camp stove when you are ready for dinner. You can bake these up the night before you go camping and then wrap each individual Sausage Roll in foil. Place several foil-wrapped Sausage Rolls in a gallon-sized ziploc bag and add to your cooler to take on your trip.  I do recommend eating them towards the beginning of your trip, just to make sure that melting ice & water doesn’t get into the foil & make the bread soggy, but that’s why you should also put these in a ziploc bag to prevent that from happening.

When you’re ready to eat, just take each foil-wrapped Sausage Roll & place along the campfire grate on the outside to heat them up for a few minutes.  If there is a burn ban or you don’t have a fire ring, you can also heat them up on the camp stove, just make sure that no water got into the ziploc bag as it can make the outsides burn, so just keep an eye on them & it should only take a few minutes to heat these all the way through.

Cook at Camp:

If you’d prefer to have these freshly made at camp, they are very simple to put together at camp, too. Using Johnsonville Fully Cooked & Smoked sausages makes the process go much quicker since you don’t have to cook the meat, but just reheat it. Make sure you keep the frozen dinner rolls in the cooler (they can be kept frozen or thawed as long as they stay cool).  You would assemble these Sausage Rolls just as I shared in the recipe directions, with thawing out the dinner rolls & flattening them out. Cut your sausages in half if you’d like to fill them with toppings, although they are very flavorful on their own with all the different varieties. Then cover the sausages with the roll dough & seal them up. Wrap them in foil & put them right over the fire to cook up the bread. You will need to cook them for at least 20 minutes over the fire & make sure you are turning them occasionally.  Check them every so often to make sure they don’t get burnt as we’ve found it is easy to burn things over the fire if you aren’t watching carefully.

Other Options:

Put these on a stick to reheat at the campground –

Kids love cooking hot dogs or bratwursts over the fire on a stick and these would be fun for them to cook as well, as they would feel very similar to a corn dog for them. I would recommend pre-cooking these & then just toasting / warming them up over the fire to get them warm & gooey from the cheese on the inside & a little crunchy on the outside.

Get Kids Involved in Making these Cheese Sausage Rolls

My girls, especially my youngest, love to help in the kitchen and this is the perfect recipe for them to assemble. In fact, I had my girls assemble these for us last night as we had Back to School night & a babysitter arriving not long after we got home from school, so they saved me time by helping me put these together! Then they can decide on the toppings they want inside their rolls, too, and make them just the way they like!

Johnsonville Fully Cooked and Smoked Sausages:

There is such a wide variety of options of these Johnsonville Fully Cooked and Smoked Sausages including 3 new Naturals flavors this year. Other varieties to try include Chili Cheese Smoked Sausage Links, Pizza Sausage links, Beer Brat links & more!

Here are the 3 new Naturals flavors to check out:

Naturals: White Cheddar Smoked Sausage

Naturals: Jalapeno Cheddar Smoked Sausage

Naturals: Andouille Smoked Sausage

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Printable Recipe::

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What are your favorite camping recipes to make? We’d love to hear what you all love to make when you head out for a camping trip?

 

This is a sponsored conversation written by me on behalf of Johnsonville. The opinions and text are all mine.