Food thread! Favourite leftover dishes, avoiding waste, menu ideas.

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Thought I’d start a thread for everyone to post their tips and ideas on how best to use foodstuffs. Hoping it could be an easy guide as well for those who maybe aren’t so used to home cooking or using leftover foods, or understanding how best to utilise everything you have, expiry dates etc.

We have always been very conscious of food waste so we plan very carefully to use every scrap of food, it’s not hard, it’s just a skill one develops.

I’ll post some of my favourite leftover/using up bits meals and menus here and if anyone else wants to as well, please do!

Could anyone help with ideas for left over roast pork for a trying fussy family. My dm usually takes the left over meat home with her as dh hates cold roast meat but obvs that's not happening.

So there is dh and 2 dds to feed (I am veggie). Pork is lovely shoulder for the farm shop which will just be simply roasted today.

DH is a veggie hater but tolerates tomatoes and onions in sauces. He likes spicy as does Dd2. Dd1 does not like spicy and can't tolerate potatoes.

I have a good pantry herb and spice wise, all the carbs etc.

Any ideas? DH won't go for a fried rice variant or anything which leaves the pork 'dry'. I was thinking maybe something bbq esque

Pulled pork with bbq sauce? In buns, with maybe coleslaw or something of that sort?

Thanks weeds, that's kind of what I was thinking. Last time I tried they refused to eat it mind!

Maybe a pie, with sauce over the pork?

LaMarschallin Have you thought if separating the eggs before you fry them? Then you can use the raw whites elsewhere. You have to be veeeeery gentle with the yolk but it retains just enough white to protect it without it being noticable in the taste. I did this for my oldest DD when she was small. I know! I cant believe I had the time ir the patience back then. Xx

*or

I was about to suggest fried rice as thats what DH always does then read the last bit :)

I'm also veggie but DH and DCs like any leftover Sunday dinner meat reheated in fresh gravy and served in a giant Yorkshire pudding with a bit of mash and some peas.

We’re making naan breads today to use up some out of dead bread flour. Then am planning another cauliflower curry later! Excited

Yes, you can reheat gently in gravy and serve as a roast dinner again with slightly different elements for variety.

You can also store it in gravy in the fridge to keep it moist. I sometimes do that if I’m going to make Christmas leftover sandwiches (some years we have a big pork roast as that’s traditional in Denmark where I’m from). We love a pork sandwich here! Have you tried just slicing it cold and using as sandwich meat? It’s so tasty. Extra salt (of course!) and maybe some pickled gherkin, or fried onions. It’ll last a good few days in the fridge so you could have it for lunches.

Asian broth with a selection of whatever veg he will tolerate, with very thin slices of pork, had over rice or noodles. Spring onion, chilli and herbs to garnish each bowlful. The basic broth can be quite gently fragranced and your DH can add extra spice to his.

A lot of my usual suggestions wouldn’t work, I don’t think, if he doesn’t like the meat ‘dry.’ But you could do boulangère potatoes with slices of meat in amongst the potatoes - would keep the meat lovely and moist.

You could do pulled pork with a different sauce too (bbq sauce is too much for me - I don’t like the way the cloying sweetness messes with the meaty flavours).

Oh just saw that DD can’t eat potatoes.

In this case I might just do different things for each of them!

Does your DH not eat ham, then? Because if he likes ham or lunch meats then surely he could get his head round slices of pork in a sandwich?

Annoyed at myself, should have read the post more thoroughly since none of my suggestions are even relevant!

Oh I guess he could have his broth/soup without any veg at all...I didn’t realise it was that severe! Apologies for giving a load of useless suggestions.

@quince2figs I used this one as a guide for the method but I did do quite a lot of it ad hoc - I had already marinated the chicken in tandoori spices so I just added some garlic and ginger to the marinade once I’d decided to follow this recipe, plus a little bit of garam masala. I also added the veg, and substituted parsley as that’s what I had. I didn’t make the saffron milk as I don’t have saffron and I didn’t want to use milk - so I substituted the same quantity of boiled water. I also sprinkled the rice with turmeric, paprika and garam masala at the end, mostly just for colour.

Forgot the link! Here you go:

www.indianhealthyrecipes.com/hyderabadi-biryani-recipe/

I also used breast rather than joints as that is what we had and needed to use. I cooked it for 35 min at 200 in a cast iron pan and the chicken was cooked but still lovely and tender.

I pre cooked the rice for 8 min.

Masala dhosa filled with leftover potato curry.

Ooh what a nice idea for leftover curry Weeds. Do the pancakes us gram flour by any chance? (Looking for opportunities to use some up).
We’ve just had a lovely lunch of leftover chill con carne with homemade garlic naan. I know they don’t match but it was lush.
We also made a date and banana bread to salvage two very brown bananas.

No, they use rice and urid daal.
They should be more browned than that, but I just couldn't get them to brown for some reason. Batter a bit wet maybe?
Nice and crispy though.

furble your banana bread looks delicious!

@Weedsnseeds1 thanks for keeping me right on food storage and safety

Jam and crumble cooking now - there was still a LOT of fruit and I've no idea on measurements as no scales but guesstimated.

Will let you all know how they turn out.

Got quorn sliced fillets dated yesterday I need to use up so thinking while oven on for crumble will do another chicken casserole maybe

Leftover pork - maybe a soup? Pea n Ham type thing? Or chopped finely and mixed with eggs and cheese for a quiche? Or stir-fry with varying amounts of chilli for spicy.

Any ideas of what to do with pancake MIx? I seem to have about 3 packets of pancake Mix - DP bought them as a flour-substitute when I couldn't get flour. They have Flour and Dried Skimmed milk in, the sort you mix with water and an egg for pancakes/yorkshires. Reckon I could use them for baking?

Dinner today is Shepherds Pie with roast cauli, and banana muffins (using the old bananas that I keep in the freezer when they've 'gone over') and a school-dinner type desert I call Oaty Fruity. It's a flapjack-type base with jam dotted on top and the rest of the base crumbled over. Served with custard!

Anyone got a reliable flapjack recipe? I really fancy some.

@ptumbi wish I had batter mix I could have made clafoutis (a sort of sweet Yorkshire pudding)

Other Ideas:

Yorkies
Pancakes - I'm sure they can be made in a way that can be stored in fridge?
Toad in the hole
Churros
Tortillas
Savoury pancakes
Can be used to batter chip shop style anything like fish, chicken, sausages,
Tempura

Toad in the hole with pankake mix?

Big batch of 'past their best' veg soup for lunches this week, to be served with part baked rolls