To not understand people that dont eat leftovers?

[Eliza9917]

I've seen a lot of people say this, and wondered why? What could eating leftovers possibly do to you? Is it a fear of poverty in some way?

My sister knew a girl that would roast a chicken for Sunday dinner and only eat the breasts and throw the rest away. To me, that's madness, I'd get at least 2-3 dinners and a soup out of a large chicken.

Jesus this thread is killing me! I actually want to cry at the waste!

Left over pizza cold for breakfast the next day is a delicious treat!

Leftover chinese fried rice cold the next day with extra soy sauce - amazing.

Left over curry, chilli or similar brilliant lunch.

Cold meat and stuffing leftover from a sunday/Christmas dinner served with chips - awesome.

Leftover lasagne reheated absolute food of the gods.

Seriously folks, just drop me a message I will be round to collect!

And please if you have guests offer the leftovers to them if you won't use them. I am not poor but I genuinely enjoy leftovers and hate to see them being binned. My best friend knows this now and always sends me home with the takeaway leftovers.

I also like a lovely bit of breast of the roast chicken. But I actually like the things I make with the rest of the chicken better.

It isn't about making do. It's having fabulous quality ingredients to make other things. And not being wasteful.

I can understand that you might not have time to do this, or your cooking skills may be limited. But I don't see why you think the rest of us are doing it to make the chicken stretch for purely financial reasons.

The only people I know who boast that they cook a chicken and throw most of it away haven't got two pennies to rub together most of the time!

I've got a big log of bubble and squeak from last nights roast duck dinners mash and veg leftovers chilling in the fridge that me and DP are going to cut into slices, fry off and have with poached eggs for dinner. Half a duck left too which will be shredded and chucked on the side. We've lived on leftovers all week and I love it. It's been the first week in a very long time we haven't thrown a carrier bag full of wasted out of the fridge ready for the fresh shopping.

I love using up all the food we buy. It’s very rare that we throw much out at all. I guess it helps that we’re both good cooks and my OH especially is very good at thinking up inventive ways to use bits and pieces. And we don’t eat weird, ‘throw a load of random crap into a pan’ meals, either. Each one is a proper thought-out meal that is just as lovely as if we had cooked it from scratch that day.

We do get at least two meals out of a chicken, three if it’s a good sized one. Sometimes I can get an extra lunch out of it for myself (something like a chicken Caesar salad with the last bits off the carcass).

We love curries, stews, soups, etc. They are all great for cooking extra so there is another meal, and they taste better and better as the days go on. I won’t waste any little bits that are left either - I’ll take it to work for my lunch.

I guess some people might not know or understand how to ensure food is kept properly, but I’m very confident and have never had any problems with food poisoning. People who get all het up about use by/best before dates on veg and lots of other foods that are perfectly fine to eat make me chuckle, but then I suppose it’s obvious if you understand and not so obvious if you don’t. I just always think what on Earth do you think people did before fridges and before use by dates became a thing? Lots of people don’t know, for example, that once you have cooked meat you re set the use by date by three days. If you don’t know that you might routinely throw meat out that would have been fine to cook up and eat a couple of days later.

I don’t like waste. I see it as my responsibility to use wisely the resources that are freely and easily available to me as a direct result of my privilege.

NoPhelange

If you've still got the fat from that duck, I tell you what is satisfying.

A few weeks ago, we had roast duck. I kept the fat that came out of it by pouring it into a glass and putting it in the fridge. On Christmas day, we had the most amazing duck fat roast potatoes imaginable. I don't know how long duck fat last, but I'd say it's been there about 6 weeks and it's fine.

And we still have some more fat for probably another two batches of roast potatoes . At the weekend, we're having duck fat roasties again, which I'm quite excited about.

I don't know how long duck fat last, but I'd say it's been there about 6 weeks and it's fine.

It lasts forever. I've kept goose fat from one Christmas - a goose will provide three jam jars of goose fat, at least - and still been using it the following December. If you look at jars of goose fat in supermarkets you'll see that it's routinely dated years into the future.

(My discovery recently is that you can remove the two largest lumps of fat from a goose prior to cooking and render it down while the goose is cooking, so that you have clean fresh fat just in time for the roast potatoes).

Forgot to say, before Christmas all the supermarkets had pots of duck or goose fat for about £3 each and I had a load that was leftover when I bought a duck.

I was a little baffled why people would pay £3 for a pot of duck fat, when for about £8 you can get a whole duck, use the meat for a lovely meal and have all the fat leftover anyway.

Yes, we didn’t buy goose fat either - we kept the fat that rendered down from the goose we had for Christmas dinner (including the two fatty bits mentioned above, which we did separately on the hob), used some on the day for the roast potatoes, and the rest will be kept for however long it takes to use it up. So good.

Some people genuinely do not fancy leftovers. Many do. Fine.

However I also think the edicts about food safety have frightened many people to death. They are afraid they haven't cooled down food properly to either refrigerate or freeze for re use. They are then afraid to reheat it in case of food poisoning. They are afraid to eat anything beyond BBD. They are terrified of dying from reheating cooked rice or chicken or whatever. And so on.

The message is NOT given that it's ok to cook defrosted food and then refreeze. There is so much confusion out there, that it's usually binned.

I could go on.

Maybe it's the way I was brought up, but any leftovers go straight into Tupperware, into the fridge/freezer, and get used up. Always! I don't throw anything away. For my DM it was due to financial reasons (and the fact that she was brought up post-war, when you just didn't throw food away), but for me, it's just to avoid wastefulness.

Obviously batch cooking is a form of leftovers (i.e, making a big batch of bolognaise and freezing half), but I'm talking about odds and ends that don't quite get finished at each meal.

Currently in my fridge (from memory) there are a couple of cooked sausages (will be chopped up and eaten cold with salad for my lunch) a cooked burger (one of the kids can microwave and eat in a bun for a snack) some cooked broccoli (will end up on someone's plate tonight), some smoked salmon (tomorrow's lunch), half a tin of tomatoes (will chuck into the next bolognaise) etc. etc. etc. We only finished the Christmas turkey yesterday.

In fact, I love being inventive with leftovers - as a teenager my favourite snack was to sauté some cold rice and chuck in any leftover meat/veg and smother it in cheese to make a sort of risotto.

@Eliza9917 I don't need to grow up. Maybe you should stop being such a tight arse.

I'm just imagining all the middle aged lower middle class types sitting on their dirty sofas with their rescue whippets eating the remains of a chicken from last week

I can't believe there's people who take food they're relatives are throwing away how embarrassing.

The message is NOT given that it's ok to cook defrosted food and then refreeze. There is so much confusion out there, that it's usually binned.

See here:

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/_chat/3467035-can-i-freeze-soup-i-ve-made-with-turkey-stock-that-was-frozen

We often cook just the right amount, or quite well estimated with only a little extra left over (which then gets used for a single portion another day). It just depends on the meal, doesn’t it.

But I’d rather have extra, in case someone wants a bit more or is more hungry than they thought, so we end up with food left over sometimes. Cooking extra to begin with on meals like macaroni cheese, lasagne, curry, minestrone, etc doesn’t really count i suppose as I just look at that as cooking two meals in one, mostly for convenience but also because it’s better value financially.

Also leads to less packaging waste e.g. a chicken rather than 3 packs of chicken pieces.

i can't believe there's people who take food they're relatives are throwing away how embarrassing

What's embarrassing about that?

I'm proud to minimise waste.

Lol @mabelstanley I'm not tight at all. I buy whole chickens just for the dog. But she'll be given every bit over several days, not just the breast.

I also recognise that I'm extremely lucky to be able to feed my dog what many class a luxury so I don't waste what I do have.

I can't believe there's people who take food they're relatives are throwing awayconfused how embarrassing.

Yes, why is it embarrassing?

My mother seems unable to cook for fewer than 15 when we visit. She offers, I take leftovers off her hands.

My MIL is the best cake maker ever, when she offers I won’t say no.

I volunteer at a Community Fridge. This morning someone was waiting for me to arrive with the food I had collected from local supermarkets that was past it's best before date, so that they could use those ingredients to feed their children today. It was that or they go hungry.

I find the weird pride on this thread of being able to throw away perfectly good food mind blowing and shameful.

I can't believe there's people who take food they're relatives are throwing awayconfused how embarrassing. (sic)

We have a roast chicken at the weekend. We use the breast meat to feed the two of us and throw out the rest

So fucking wasteful. Really hoping your on the wind up.

I can't believe there's people who take food they're relatives are throwing awayconfused how embarrassing.

Like others have asked, why is stopping food waste embarrassing?

@Eliza9917 must be a small dog if it takes her days to eat a whole chicken.

I don't actually care if people use leftover it just annoys me how people get so sanctimonious about waste. What I throw away doesn't directly affect you so why do you care?

Because it's grabby and makes you look tight, and if you think it doesn't then you're deluding yourself.

What I throw away doesn't directly affect you so why do you care?

The future of the planet does affect me rather directly - doesn't it affect you?

That's your opinion mabel. Many disagree.

When so many people don't have enough to eat, the planet is being destroyed by overconsumption or pesticides etc and animals are kept in disgusting inhumane conditions so that we can have so much cheap meat that people just throw it away, now that is embarrassing.

In the UK, most people are extremely fortunate that they can buy as much food as they need, which we should be bloody grateful for, not take for granted and waste by not making the most of it.