Use it up! Don't throw it in the bin!

bluebag

I have a bright orange carrier bag in the freezer just for leftovers.

I have some huge breakfast cups I line with polythene bags and freeze any leftovers in, they just slide out of the cups once frozen and then I wrap them again in a second polythene bag to prevent freezer burn. I label then with a scrap of paper between the two layers.

It's a kind of TV dinner stock I suppose as my lot are always looking for snacks and stuff, so I can usually microwave curry and rice or chilli or soup or even bang up a fast sausage mash and beans.

betterlife

had left over soup yesterday, it started with a couple wrinkly leeks and an onion lightly fryed popped in saucepan with potatoes, carrots, lentils and left over chicken, then from the freezer was a bag of about 6 roast pots (from previous roast dinner,) and a chopped up cooked gammon steak, 2 slices of belly pork and rasher of bacon (all leftovers) with chicken stock freshly made this was a truely yummy pan full which feed all 6 of us twice

funkymonkey849

I have half a pumpkin which tasted a bit bland in soup and don't really know what to do with it! Any ideas welcome

mlz1413

more salt & pepper needed!!

there is a website all receipes.co.uk that have lots and lots of suggestions from cake to soup and with pasta. also hints for using the seeds.

I make butternut squash with a garlic, thyme, cream and butter sauce. Would think pumpkin would be the some.

cut into equal sized chunks, roast with some oil for 20 mins or until soft.

melt butter and gently fry crushed garlic, add thyme (or any herbs) pour in cream and stir gently to mix. Pour over squash/pumpkin and roast for 15 mins more or until soft.

surprisingly filling so is a meal on its own.

mrs_skint

This is a brilliant forum guys. My budget has been cut so I'm looking around for tips and ideas to save money and I would just like to say that some of the ideas here as genius. Keep it up and thanks xxx

Gothicfairy

Do you have a standby recipe that works with almost anything ?

I ask this because I often end up with small bits of stuff but nothing in enough quantity to make a whole dish and I am on a new life kick of not throwing away any food if edible.
Proper recipes don't really help there as you can't list the whole set of ingredients until you have a dig about in the fridge and it is hard to find anything in a book that fits the bill.

Take tonight, I have about a quarter ( if I am lucky) of cold cooked chicken, a very very small head of broccoli, a corn on the cob, and some home made beef bone stock.
There is of course onions and garlic etc so I am thinking of a "rock" soup (not sure if anyone else remembers the story of the begger and the rock soup)

I find rock soup is a great way of using up bits but it can cause problems when I find a bit of lettice in the fridge and can't make that fit.
I also do Mexican Enchiladas as that seems to take a lot of bits and bobs and can even cover things that are slighlty going over.

My biggest problem seems to be though that I never get left with things that go together and there is also always just 1 carrot (no idea how or why that happens either but there is only ever 1)

what bits do you seem to always have left over ? and what do you do with them ?

morganlefay

I do a thing which I think is quite horrible-sounding but usually tastes OK and is sometimes very tasty: I boil some spuds till just cooked, then tip them into Remoska (you could use casserole dish in oven or even a saucepan at a pinch) then I hurl in all the 'bits' - if raw broccoli I'd cook it a bit, I'd chop meat up so it's same-size bits etc etc. If there's nothing very tasty in there I might chop and fry a rasher or two of bacon. Then I make a thinnish white sauce, tip it over the lot, stir and heat. I'd probably put some grated cheese in there or scatter some on top. My cunning trick for making nice crispy crumbs is to make a cheese sandwich with one slice of bread, lots butter and cheese. Then blitz it in Magimix - it makes really nice crispy topping which the Remoska makes all brown and crunchy - but you could put it under grill. OH who is a v fussy eater always eats this sort of mixture very happily without realising he's finishing up the scraps.

Want2BMoneySavvy

Omlette or fritatta. Pop any leftover meat in to flavour it, and any use up any leftover veg. If you have a couple of cold sliced potatoes, a fritatta is great for lunches.

RAS

Hi

This is a Mel Bartholomew idea:

You know what you often have bits of, so devise a few recipes that freeze well (there may be a few things you have bits of that do not freeze well, but this is a starter for those that do).

So maybe chicken and sweetcorn to go with white sauce in a pie (potato or pastry covered) at a push the brocolli could go in.
Or root vegtable soup.
Or pea or carrot soups

You may not have enough to make the quantity needed for the whole family but you have leftovers regularly.

Allocate a sealed tub to each recipe. When you get small quantities of extra root veg, cook it and put the "left-overs" in it allocated tub. Next time you have some leftover root veggies, do the same. Or do this with the chicken and sweetcorn, in layers.

When the tub has enough contents to make the dish.

That way you build up enough leftovers to make a decent meal but do not hneed them all at once.

radiohelen

Stovies - I love stovies. Uses up a multitude of stuff. Meat and tatties in a pan. http://www.scottishrecipes.co.uk/stovies.htm

Bubble and squeak with an egg on top mmmmmmmm!

Curry - you can put almost anything in a curry - I usually have tinned tomatos and paste around.

Mexican wraps - enchiladas or whatever you want to call them.

Egg Fried rice - uses up all sorts of bits.

HTH