For some, leftovers can be a doom sentence. While some of us look at leftovers as the best thing in the world. All will agree that the leftovers with all that green furry topping are pretty ugly. Leftovers eaten three nights in a row can be pretty bad. Leftovers made into great tasting meals can be a good thing and believe it or not can save money. Let’s take a look at ways to use those leftovers to our benefit.

Re-purposing Those Leftovers

Holidays – Leftovers during holidays usually surmount into outrageous quantities. If you are getting tired of the same old turkey or ham sandwiches for the following week, try changing it up for breakfast. Combine the mashed potatoes, stuffing and diced meat in a pan creating a little creator for an egg. Pop it all in the oven for ten minutes on 350 degrees and you have a hearty egg in a nest for breakfast. This is a complete meal with your meat, grains and dairy. It’s also not a bad way to start a day off from the turkey hang-over from the night before.

Meat – A staple of many households is ground meat. It is a perfect start to practice re-purposing leftovers on. A couple pounds of ground beef can be used for hamburgers, then the next day for tacos and finally as an addition to spaghetti sauce or a warm crock pot of chili. Steaks are also great leftovers to utilize for a couple of days. Eaten first as a main dish with mashed potatoes and green beans, cut into strips to top a hearty salad and finally cut into chunks for stews or soups.

Remember to have fun with you leftovers. Try a different spice or mix and match them to create a new treat for everyone to try. Just remember that the taste is what is most important. Watch the ingredients while watching the taste. Sounds hard? It’s not. Let’s take a look at how to accomplish just that.

Ingredients

Let’s take the hamburger meat as an example. What ingredients did you put into it for the actual hamburger? Salt, pepper and maybe some Italian seasoning were used. Keep these ingredients in mind when re-purposing the hamburger because it may not need more salt in the dish you are trying to create. If there was plenty of salt for the hamburger, cut out the salt in the new recipe and see if that works well. Bread crumbs, ketchup and possibly even some A-1. If you went heavy on the A-1 sauce, this might not work well re-purposed as a breakfast casserole. A meatloaf on the other hand might be the way to go. Just remember what you put in will determine what kind of dish you want to reuse the meat for.

Taste

Let’s use a holiday breakfast make over as an example. One can only assume that since mashed potatoes, stuffing and turkey all go together in a meal, that they can all be used together in a single dish. Pretending with your mouth can get you a long way when cooking. If you think it will taste good together, go for it. If your instincts tell you otherwise then don’t try it. Think about how the food will taste together to get a good idea of the expected outcome.

Yes there is a good, bad and ugly to leftovers. Reusing leftovers can be a challenge but it can also be a blast. Have fun with your leftovers. Remember to keep tasting as you cook to insure you are on the right track. Most importantly be sure to use those leftovers before they become a green furry mess that ends up in the garbage disposal. Try reusing your leftovers to make hearty nutritious meals for your family and watch the dollars begin to stack up.