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

[Ninkanink]

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!

@Weedsnseeds1 I’m not sure i want to make yoghurt - I was raised in a very hippy dippy family and that’s one of the things I seem to have really rebelled against, for whatever reason 😆 I did used to make beautifully thick yoghurt back in the day, though, so it might soon be time to re-evaluate that stance. 😃 it’s true, there definitely wouldn’t be enough to make hardly any at all, I was more thinking literally a couple of balls for my DH to have. But that would probably be a bit silly...

Stew wasn’t my best but was very nice all the same. Think the meat and onions could have done with more browning before I added the rest of the ingredients in. But was still lovely and it’ll be lunch tomorrow and maybe the next day if there’s some left.

Morrisons box arrived, it’s OK but would definitely rather be able to pick stuff myself. Price wise it’s so much better tho, I guess because they are the only chain delivering, all the other business are local and they are charging a lot more.

Yeah it is just a basics box, but was very welcome in our household(s) to keep things going until we could find a better source for food - by the time we get our shopping delivery it will have been four weeks since I booked it!

Ninkanink, I was raised in a household where boiling was the only known cooking method and instant mash was used as a universal thickening agent for the sloppy horrors produced!
I learned to cook at an early age, as a form if self defence!

I was very pleased to see the broccoli tho, after growing up hating it I absolutely love it now

Awful reading about that roast chicken, I don’t quite do the “mumsnet chicken” but I always get more than one meal out of a chicken. I feel incredibly guilty on the rare occasions that that doesn’t happen, I just don’t know why you’d buy a chicken to eat so little of it when you can just buy skin on chicken breasts!

We did a deconstructed roast chicken once, we wanted roast chicken but all I could find was skin on thighs and some mini breast fillets so just roasted them all together, tasted no different so no reason why someone couldn’t do that if they didn’t want the whole chicken.

I have lots of eggs in at the moment but rapidly going "out of date" normally I'm happy to use past date but with the weather and all the cooking I've been doing my kitchen has been ROASTING!

Will they definitely still be ok to use?

Catching up on the thread. Lots more delicious looking and clever creations. We’ve been eating leftovers only so far this week but they’re nearly all finished now so I’ve made a spinach, pea and pesto lasagne tonight.

The recipe called for mascarpone but I had some questionable looking but fine smelling and tasting defrosted double cream to use up, so that’s gone in instead along with two tins of peas that my DH bought when he went shopping for me once instead of frozen, glad to have put them to good use. Didn’t quite have enough lasagne sheets so broke up a few cannelloni to fill the gaps!

Hope the kids will eat it. I’m not providing an alternative! Please can we have a round two of this thread when this one fills up, it really is my comfort blanket in this crazy time.

Graphista fill a glass or jug with water and put the egg in. If it floats, don't eat it, if it sinks, or touches the bottom but sits slightly "upright", it's fine.

Pesto lasagne doesn’t look half bad actually!

Used up a half-full jar of mincemeat (left over from Christmas) today in this Brown Sugar Mincemeat Cake.

@Graphista you will definitely know if they’re no longer good!

Is there anywhere else in your home that you could store the eggs, just to be on the safe side? We are keeping everything that needs a more temperate storage in our hallway or the office.

@Furble oh yes I’ll definitely set up another Frugal Foodies thread - I’ve really loved this one, it’s been such a nice place to hang out with you all!

🧁 and 🍩 and ☕️ for all!

Only place that's cooler is the fridge and that's pretty full at the moment I generally don't store in fridge

I found a bag of chickpeas this morning so decided to make some houmous. Cooked the chickpeas in the slow cooker until tender then chucked them in the blender with lemon juice, garlic, olive oil, cumin, chili, balsamic vinegar, red onion and fresh coriander.

Blitzed it all, smelt great until smoke started wafting from the bottom of the blender 😱😰

This tasted so much nicer than it looked-dh wanted carbonara. I wanted stroganoff. We had a sort of hybrid.

Yes, that is pasta! Finishing off odds and ends of a couple of bags I found at the back of the cupboard.

Dinner was good.

Leftover lasagne, filled jacket potato, garlic bread, and fresh coleslaw made with cabbage, carrot, cucumber and onion, plus lemon, wholegrain mustard, mayo and parsley for the dressing. Seasoned with salt and pepper and just a touch of sweetener.

That was the last bit of the sour cream all used up, and the last two baking potatoes, plus the very last bit of juice from a piece of lemon that I’d already used yesterday. 👍

Oh and the last two part-baked rolls from the packet! 👍

Mmm, that looks, tasty.

Leftover pork chops, with a sort of spicy BBQ sauce, the last of the burger buns and guacamole

Ohhhhh I’m dreaming of guacamole!

Purple Daisies I think I may have some orange, pumpkin shaped, novelty Halloween pasta somewhere!

Ninkanink I had a pack of Morissons wonky avocado's, that sat on my counter, like sullen, green rocks for what felt like a month. Today they all spontaneously ripened!

And ripened in the way that you know you have about 1 hour to use them before they turn black!

My bananas have done similar! Firm and yellow just this morning soft and very brown tonight. I've popped them in the fridge but stumped what to do with them without being able to get hold of flour! I have a trusty banana loaf recipe but it requires flour!

I have a Betty Crocker cake mix but I don't know if I can use them instead of the egg or milk? Or as well as?

Only other things I can think of are mash and freeze hoping it's ice cream like or use in smoothies made just using a fork to mash/whisk

Tonight's dinner was stir fry as I didn't really fancy omelette but I used the bacon in it not sure if it would work - it did! Very tasty.

Quorn bacon, sliced bell pepper, mushrooms, baby corn (from try stir fry pack) served on cous cous with a hoisin sauce.

Over ripe bananas freeze very well.
Or maybe you could use the cake mix to make American style pancakes? What are the ingredients of the mix?