to ask what you do with the kids' leftovers?

[mrspepperpotty]

Like many of you, I expect, I am starting 2012 with a resolution to eat healthily and lose weight. One of my biggest weaknesses is finishing off the kids' leftovers. So tonight me, DH and the 3 DCs have just eaten spinach and ricotta cannelloni for supper. There are 2 bits of cannelloni left. I am NOT NOT NOT not going to eat them however much I want to! But what would you do?

1. Throw them away. Seems like such a waste!
2. Put them in a tupperware box the fridge. But it's not enough for a full meal for DH or me. Would be enough for 1 of the DCs but it's rare I'm feeding just 1 and not the other 2. And cannelloni isn't really something you snack on between meals. So I'll just end up throwing them away anyway in a week or so.

I wOuld agree entirely with forever on a diet. Cannelloni is tomorrows side dish.

Start off by putting a little food on the plate, and they can always have seconds if they like. Then you have food in the serving dishes that can be put in the fridge and kept for the next day. This helps children get healthier eating habits, as they learn to judge whether they would like seconds or not that day.

One thing that I noticed at Christmas is that DH and I have gravitated towards cooking things that can be turned into a different dish the next day, so potato becomes bubble and squeak, or sausages become sausage casserole. DSiL cooks food for her kids that can't do that, and it ends up just being thrown away. I wonder if that might work for you?

And I agree with Grendelsmum - my eating issues as an adult arise I am sure as when I was a child I was given a serving and told to finish it - how did my parents know how hungry I was? I give my DC small servings and they can have seconds or thirds. If there is anything left on their plate its because they didn't eat the very small first serving, hence they will probably be hungry later.

But we rarely have leftovers - because I'd rather cook a bit less and they (we) can have yoghurt or fruit if still hungry. If you cook too much end up eating too much.

My DS has never been a big eater, so I suppose because his portin sizes were on the small side in the first place, there have never been many leftovers and they have always gone in the bin, as I hate eating from someone else's plate too.

If it has been on their plates then squirt with washing up liquid as soon as it leaves the table so you won't be tempted to pick at it. Then scrape it all into the bin.

A couple of things.

When I was a child my mother fussed and clucked and bothered me to finish things, try things, she cut it, she bribed, she bothered. I can remember meals when I was starving and refused to eat because it was a battle ground and I refused to be badgered. I spent my 20's on the edge of anorexia.

As a mother, and the dc are 13 and 17 now - I have spent years picking their left overs and taking a penne from the left over dish in the fridge every time the door is opened or a slice of salami. That is why I am now 2lb heavier than my heaviest pregnancy weight

I am not going to eat any more leftovers - they are all going in the bin from now on. By the end of 2012 I AM going to be my pre pregnancy weight - well at 51 perhaps within aout 8 or 9lb of it.

If leftovers from their plate, you have to start giving them smaller portions. If they want more they can always have some.

If leftovers not on plates, I always store in tupperware boxes. I often end up with a few, which can be used for a quick meal, or part of one, or as a sort of pick and mix for the children to choose what they want at a "left overs" meal.

It is a big waste to throw food away, so I try to minimise it.

Do your children not eat really random amounts, fifteenfiftyfive and others? DD will sometimes eat more than me, other times hardly anything - roughly I would say she eats like a horse for a week, stops dead and then grows about 2 inches overnight. Obviously up to a point you can deal with that by asking how much she wants, or putting the pans on the table for people to help themselves (not spaghetti & sauce though!), but its not always accurate.

Answer here is stuff not on plates = tomorrows lunch, anything from a plate to the chickens or the dog depending on what it is.

MrsPepperPotty Sure they're a bit young to help themselves, but you can give them the smallest portion they're likely to want and then they're able to ask for "More" if they want it?

Whatever you decide, please do not put protein/cooked food on the compost, for the obvious(?) reason, that it attracts vermin.

Compost, dog bowl or bin here. Over-judging quantities when you cook is not a crime. Not finishing your dinner is not a crime punishable by being served manky leftovers the next day. If they didn't want it when it was fresh, they are even less likely to want it when it is cold and horrible.

Obviously, there are some foods (eg roast chicken) that ARE nice cold, and I always keep a chicken carcass for a day or two as sandwich fodder for lunches.

Pleaseeeeeee, not the compost How about the neighbours dog?

Smallclanger - its usually my lunch, not dd's!

Meat goes to the cats. I eat any raw veg or salad or put it in the compost.

Driftwood, I only put stuff like salad and veg in the compost. We don't have a vermin problem as the compost bin is quite secure.

At this time of the year, various things go on the bird table too. You attract all kinds of species with different types of food.

But leftovers can be yummy, not manky at all! I think people are imagining nasty mashed up remains on the edges of someone's plate when they say it's a punishment to have to eat them the next day. That's the great value of putting out a little food and then having a second helping - the food is still 'clean' and attractive and can be turned into something else the next day. No sense that it's going to waste, so there's no guilt for anyone in not eating it right at that moment.

A close friend is a medical researcher specialising in women's obesity, and she does say that eating kids' leftovers from their plates is a very common and 'invisible' source of calories for a lot of women.

I save leftovers through the week and then there's lots of little bits of things to assemble a leftovers smorgasbord on the weekend for DH who I have carefully trained to be a human compost machine.

Other ideas might be to save them to offer your ultra-picky child (my DC3) if he doesn't like the dinner on offer one night, feed them to a dog (depending on the content) or take out a small portion before it gets plated and freeze it for another night for the DCs (you could pull a bunch of different things out of the freezer on a busy day and do a mix-and-match meal or defrost and heat to put in a lunchbox thermos).

Don't, don't, DON'T eat them yourself. Nobody needs seconds of dinner unless they are a teenage boy or an ultra-athlete.

I eat DS's sometimes but more because I'm trying to put on weight and because I don't like wasting food, especially when we are skint. However it usually has the opposite effect and means it takes the edge off my hunger enough that I then forget to eat myself.

I love leftovers, and don't care if they come from someone else's plate. However, if it's a choice of eat-it-there-and-then-and-get-fat or throw-it-in-the-bin-and-waste-20p I've finally managed to master the art of "wasting" it. Because if you eat it, it isn't replacing other food you'd have eaten instead, and so you aren't actually saving anything, either money or food. The 20p/64p/£1.19 is already spent and lost.

(Leftovers not from plates I save and freeze, and eat for lunches.)

Saved for next day lunch or breakfast (I don't like any conventional breakfast foods). Often mixed with a can of soup or the like.

Little bit dog, little bit me, little bit compost. Although DS1 leaves nothing greedly little stonker and DS2 lives on Ovaltine and air and Hula Hoops.

What StopRaining says about cost is absolutely true. The only waste I get het up about is when I buy things and no-one even tries to use them. Even then, things like cheese go on the bird table at this time of year, and are very useful to have around if one of the dogs needs to take a tablet for any reason.
We are not an egg-eating household, apart from in baking, so spare eggs are gratefully received by the dogs. Eggs and cheese make really good bribes for dogs.