Sunday, July 25, 2010

The Art of Using Leftovers

   OK. Let me just start by telling you that I'm the luckiest girl alive! Adam will eat anything I cook. He's not the slightest bit picky. At school, when I'd pull out my lunch, I heard from many ladies about how their husbands only liked certain foods and wouldn't eat leftovers. Are you kidding me? Talk about wasteful! Normally, when I was working, all of our leftovers were strategically planned out as future meals for the week. So, there was never an opportunity for seconds or creative concoctions the next day. Now though, I've had lots of chances to exercise my creativity in this area. Yesterday is a good example. . .
     A few nights ago, I made chicken enchiladas with tomatillo salsa for dinner. It's one of my "go-to" recipes that has had a place in my recipe folder for several years. It's pretty labor-intensive and, for some reason, I always end up with extra filling. We were out of tortillas, so the extra filling just sat sadly in the refrigerator for a couple of days. That is, until lunch and dinner yesterday. That's right. . . I stretched about a cup of extra enchilada filling into 2 complete meals. 
Meal #1: Lunch (Mexican Chicken Salad Sandwiches)
Some of the filling (cold)
lettuce, tomatoes, and thinly sliced red onions (leftover from hamburgers)
"pita pockets" (really just some of my homemade buns that turned out flat)
- You'd be surprised at how delicious these sandwiches were. Who knew?

Meal #2: Dinner (Chicken and Tomatillo Pasta)
1/4 of a box of wheat pasta (leftover from a previous meal)
the rest of the enchilada filling (warm this time)
Caramelized onions (leftover from hamburgers)
1 sliced of sharp cheddar cheese (leftover from hamburgers)
1/4 cup of grated Parmesan cheese (all that was left in the refrigerator)
- I just mixed the cooked pasta and enchilada filling together and then topped it with caramelized onions and cheese. After a quick 20 minutes in the oven, it was ready. It wasn't the best thing I've ever put in my mouth, but it was tasty and sufficed for a quick dinner. I didn't get a picture of the end result, but here are the ingredients I used.

4 comments:

Mrs. Jonell said...

Keep it up, girl! I'm learning so much from you. :)

Brandi Hart said...

Haha, Mrs. Jonell! I don't know about that, but I'm glad you read my post. It's cool when I get comments on the blog!

Anonymous said...

You are an inspiration! And I love the new blog pic of your sweet family!

Kim

Brandi Hart said...

Thanks Kim! I sure miss you!

Post a Comment

Tell me what you think!

 

Blog Template by YummyLolly.com - Header Frame by Pixels and Ice Cream
Sponsored by Free Web Space