The consolidated "Leftovers" thread
 

When Mrs BamaVol and I were married ages ago, someone gave us a cookbook called, I think, Cooking for Two. It got a lot of use until kids came along. With 4 kids at home over a 10+ year period, there was no such thing as leftovers the next day. Anything put in the fridge after dinner would be gone by the following night. Now that we're down to the last kid, I've pulled out the book. It's been a somewhat difficult transition and I tend to cook too much still. Besides, it's more difficult to purchase food in small sizes - especially when some of the stores are moving away from service and toward bulk pre-packs that are inconveniently sized.

The book is pretty basic stuff, beginner info and recipes. But, I do like the focus on making big purchases and "Sunday dinners" and then making something different out of the leftovers. Buy a ham and make ham and cheese supper bread the next night. Buy an eye of the round and make roast beef in onion vinegar the next night and roast beef hash the next. I love picking a turkey or roaster chicken carcass apart and making open faced sandwiches with hot gravy.

Anybody got favorite leftover recipes?

I have two big dogs. :cool: There are never any leftovers when they get done. ;) I find that they are usually more civilized than my kids were when they were young.:D

Our kids are also grown & gone, so I also cook for two. Meatloaf one night is meatloaf sandwiches subsequent meals. Get plenty of variety from a leftover turkey - sanwiches, casseroles with brocolli & mushroom soup. Whenever steaks are on sale we load up and we grill lots of extra, leaving them a bit rare. They are then cut into about 1/2 to 3/4 lb portions, freezer wrap them, and freeze them. They get thawed and thin-sliced to go into a stir-fry, atop a salad, or cubed into soups. Extra pasta usually goes into a stir-fry.

Mostly, though, a dinner with leftovers becomes lunch for me for the next few days, as I work less than a mile from home. Mrs. Deubster works too far away to return at lunch, so she eats those 8 - 9 oz. frozen diet meal things at her job (that would be an appetizer for me).

Um, did they finish off that beet dish?

I like leftovers of some things - mostly enchiladas and pasta dishes. I cannot abide by left over roasts. I know I am wierd.

How did you know? I forgot to put it in the fridge. None left the next morning. :o

At least they didn't break the dish when they pulled if off of the counter. It needed more beets.............

Leftovers = dog :) Even if it smells a little funny.

A balanced diet! It is time to worry if the dog gets fat from the leftovers. ;)

(I'd probably not 'risk' the dog if the food was something I'd not touch)

It's simple. When I'm home, I eat them the next day. :)

When I'm not home, my wife leaves them in the fridge to be thrown out the next weekend. For some reason, my wife and kids don't do left overs.

Actually, I usually only cook once or twice a week. I cook a meal for 6-8 & make my own individual sized dinners of enchiladas, spaghetti, tortellini, beef stroganof & soups. I'm sure there are others I make that I can't remember right now.

I cover the top of the bowl or plate with plastic wrap & alum. foil. Then freeze the leftovers & reheat them as needed. After a while I have built up a nice selection. You just have to label the containers & date them. Then rotate out the older stuff first.

I have great containers for freezing & zapping. They are from Stouffers, Lean Cuisin & elsewhere in the frozen food aisle.

For consumption in a day or two, there is nothing better than leftover homemade stir fry with fried rice. I never freeze that.

I usually have leftovers a couple times a week. My trick is to add eggs or cheese to my meal. Or to make a sandwhich from the leftover meat.

We tend to have a lot of chicken and pork leftovers. I guess I cook smaller portions of beef.

Some ways we use leftovers:
- jambalaya
- fried rice (I usually make 2x the rice I'll need and use the rest in leftovers)
- pizza (assuming I have a crust in the freezer)
- sandwiches
- salads
- enchiladas

I made salmon cakes a few weeks ago from some leftover grilled salmon. They were pretty good.

Same here!

As an egg lover since early childhood, I've always try to include eggs to most of my meals. :)

Was that on a regular sweet cake?

Do you like cold leftovers?
 

I met a friend for lunch today at the Gold Coast hotel and we had Chinese food. As she was visiting town and I live here, I took her leftovers home and had them for dinner. As I often do, especially with Asian food, I ate it right out of the container without even thinking about warming the food up. I've found that I often end up enjoying the leftovers more than the original meal when they've had a chance to soak in their own juices and are digested cold.

Am I alone in this?

i like my cold leftovers hot. I can't stand cold leftovers, with the notable exception of meatloaf.

You should try hot iced coffee while you're at it. ^

:p

no you are not alone.

When I go visit my mom, I usually snag some leftovers out of the fridge... and more often than not, will eat it cold. Unless its pasta.

Depends on what it is. Steak, roast beef, fried/grilled chicken, meatloaf, and some cooked vegetables are fine cold. Chinese, pizza, soup, curry, and rice/noodle/pasta dishes need to be at least room temp if not heated.

I usually like to heat up the leftovers as well. They just taste better hot, imo.

I try to bring leftovers for lunch every day. Unless it's soup, I never warm it up, I leave it on my desk till lunch time, and enjoy it at room temperature.

I'm not a huge fan of leftovers straight from the fridge except for things like eggplant parm, pizza, pasta (sensing a theme here).

Cold leftovers are great for snacking while standing up, but for a sit down meal they really need to heated up, at least to me.

I often eat leftovers without reheating, though I usually like them at room temp.

I love cold thin-crust pizza with ice-cold Coke. Other than that, very few leftovers appeal to me cold.

Thing about heating up leftovers is that they often get overcooked in the process.
Reheating soupy/stewy food is okay; reheating rice is mandatory.

I don't like cold leftovers. I used to eat cold pizza pretty often when I was young and now I've pretty much grown out of that habit as well.

What will you do with a 1 day old leftovers?
 

I'm curious, what will you do with a 1 day old leftovers?
Throw it, cook it, give it to animals etc?

This is so ridiculously general it really is better off in OMNI.

The most popular dishes in Western Cuisine come from leftovers (which used to be called 'made' dishes, presumably because the main components were already made). What the Victorians considered leftovers are now dishes of first choice for many of us.

I'm sure a well heeled time traveller from the 19th Century would laugh at someone today eating fishcakes who thought it beneath them to eat food from the day before.

Some of my favourite foods come from leftovers :). Unfortunately, it's rare at my house to have any food left over :(.

Breakfast Hash....????

Depends on what it is, was it out on the counter, etc.

But in general, virtually all of our leftovers get packged into take out containers (we bought a case of them) and into the freezer for lunches down the road.

Occasionally a second meal from them, but for the most part lunches.

Take out containers? Like collapsible Chinese food containers? Please explain, with a pic or link. Seriously, I'm interested.

Back on topic - just the wife and me. I cook about 3 nights a week when not on the road. We get another 2 nights, average, eating leftovers. The remaining days, we eat out, bring takeout home, or scrounge for ourselves (sandwiches, etc.). Not hard to make 2 evening meals of a meatloaf, roast, etc. Some dishes don't do well a second day (fish, most pasta, etc.). Most of these dishes get eaten by me for breakfast or lunch (usually cold - my preference).

Growing up, my mom would cook at least 4 or 5 items for each meal. Leftovers were brought out every night in successively smaller Corningware containers until gone. Some nights there might be 10 or 12 different dishes on the dining table. :D

I read it as plastic takeaway containers - ie something like: http://www.lidatrading.com.au/files/...ontainers1.jpg

Leftovers are either saved for dinner the next day or two, or they make an excellent breakfast, hot or cold, or sometimes both if I'm impatient.

In fact, seeing as my wife rarely eats her leftovers(no idea why), I get to enjoy her meal and mine.

Amazing how close deubster's uses/habits are to ours (also just two of us). One difference is that the wife will eat her left-overs cold, but not me. She also will not eat anything older than three days. I have relatively good success with left-over pasta.

But, other than this, my grandmother used to do the same thing as deubster's mother, but she ran a boarding house that served meals 3X a day, so there could be as many as five meat courses, eight veggie courses, three different breads, and two kinds of dessert on the table at lunch and dinner. As things got devoured, they got replaced with something else.

In our house, it doesn't go to the dogs unless it is five days old.

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The newspring ones below. They have dozens of sizes, come in white and black. They are completly reusable, dishwasher safe, freezer to microwave. The only way they get damaged is if you drop them when they are frozen then the plastic shatters.

We use the rectangle ones because they stack tightly in the freezer, split a case with friends or whatever. but they come in round, oval, divided, tall, flat. They are about 29 cents each (with cover). You may be lucky enough to have a restaurant supply house locally selling them by the sleeve or even each so you don't need to buy a case.

http://www.webstaurantstore.com/news...0COMBO150.html

This pictures by the way on this website are usually pretty distorted, this one for example is way too wide, the container is not that skinny.

You can get round soup ones too.

shipping at this company is pretty high, but their prices are pretty low so it's usually still a great deal.

Most paper companies have the "goldfish box" type cartons if that is what you are looking for.

Unless the food is originally made cold (salad for example), I always heat it up. It tastes better IMO.

I'm also not a fan of cold leftovers. If it was served hot orignally, then I almost always reheat it later.

If it can be made into a sandwich the next day (chicken, meatloaf, roast beef) then it is ok cold. Otherwise, I will heat it up.

Just had some cold leftover Spanish rice with salsa. Oh, and the salsa had cilantro in it. I'm really trying to embrace cilantro. :D

Grilled salmon holds up well for me; sometimes I'll do an extra fillet with the intention of using in a salad in the next few days. Asian sesame dressing is great with it. ;)