Breathe Life Into Leftovers

In most households, leftovers tend to be stashed in the fridge after a meal and then forgotten until they need to be thrown out. Get creative and breathe new life into your leftover meals to reduce food wastage in your home. Here are some simple tricks to do just that.

Vegetables

Veggies or salad ingredients tend to form the bulk of the leftovers, so finding imaginative ways to repurpose them is important. Stir-fries, soups, wraps and quiches are the simplest ways to use up your leftover vegetables. Try our delicious Honey Chicken stir-fry with onions, peppers and carrots recipe.

Meat and poultry

Use leftover meat or poultry to create entirely new meals. Shredded roast beef, lamb, pork or chicken can be used as fillings for sandwiches, pita breads, wraps, tacos and tortillas, and you can even save the bones to create tasty broths, stocks or soups to freeze for future use. Try our Cheesy Baked Tortilla Roll Ups or Roast Lamb Tacos Recipe.

Pasta

Do you find you always boil more pasta than you need? Don’t toss out your leftover spaghetti or other noodles: instead, pop them into a cheesy frittata or save them for a cold pasta salad.

Food scraps

Usually these bits and pieces are discarded while prepping a meal:

Vegetable peels, ends and cores
Outer leaves of cabbage and cauliflower
Tops of root vegetables like carrots, beetroot and onions

A great tip is to put the scraps into a zipping plastic bag and to freeze them for using next time you make a stock or soup – simply pop them straight into the boiling water. Alternatively, you can add the scraps to your compost bin or heap. Root vegetables that have sprouted in your veggie bin, such as potatoes, sweet potatoes and garlic, can be planted in your garden – they’ll reward you with a whole new crop in the months to come.

If you’re still in need of additional inspiration, visit www.whatsfordinner.co.za​