Displaying items by tag: leftovers

Such an easy way to use leftover over pitta breads or to make to go with dips at a party. These pitta bread crisps will keep in an airtight container for at least a week, if not longer.

We had a big family celebration party at the weekend and ended up with a fridge full of leftovers, including a load of butter and selection of fresh herbs. So we made herb butter. This is how ... Snap off any thick stalks, wash and dry the herbs in a salad spinner to remove excess water. Break large pieces of room temperature butter into smaller pieces and drop evenly into the blender. Whizz for a few minutes and if needed gently poke the butter down into the herbs with a plastic spoon. You will need to do this if the butter is too cold and hard. The butter should mix evenly with the herbs. Spoon the mixture onto grease proof paper and roll into a sausage shape. Twist the ends of the paper to seal. If you want to store the herb butter in smaller quantities cut into discs once the butter has hardened in the fridge. Repack in grease proof paper and store in a plastic tub in the deep freeze until required. Remember to label the packages.Parsley gives a wonderful green tint to the mixture. The butter can be smeared on meat before barbequeing, or on grilled fish and steak. Mint is slightly less verdant than parsley but the butter is delicious added to omlettes or mixed into peas. Dill butter goes wonderfully well with salmon - and is also a great accompaniment to gently scrambled eggs. Add zest of lemon to your dill butter for extra flavour. If you don't have any pesto add basil butter to pasta dishes. Your favourite herb butter can be used to add flavour to jacket potatoes or spread onto warm bread.

• parsley and butter goes into the mixer
• spread the butter on paper and roll
• slice the chilled butter into discs
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Anyone fancy a plate of my leftover curried goat?  Leftoverswap in the USA and shareyourmeal  in the Netherlands both offer subscribers a chance to swap leftovers. Now I think that's a really good idea and they cover the UK too, linking you up with people who have food to share. But look at their map - there's a big empty space devoid of sharers in East Anglia!

Why are the British embarrassed about asking for a Doggy Bag at a restaurant?  Why do we still pretend that we are taking the leftover food home for the dog?

Tonight I made Pakora with a bag of out of date spinach which was just begining to wilt. Use any vegetables that you have shrivelling in the bottom of the fridge.  Just cut the vegetables into slices, or shred according to their density.  Remember that courgettes will cook a lot quicker than chunks of carrot. I have yet to find anyone who doesn't wolf down a plate of these delicious Indian snacks. Gram or Chickpea flour is easy to find, usually with gluten free products on the supermarket shelf, from wholefood shops or anywhere 'ethnic'.

Leftover French bread turned into a pizza for lunch today.  Did you know that if you run a stale baguette under the cold tap for a second and then place it in a hot oven for 5 or 10 minutes it's nearly as good as new?

Today for Zero Waste Week I used up all the leftover pieces of cheese in my fridge.  I made Potted Cheese. It's the perfect recipe to use any type of stale cheese and is delicious on toast or with baked potatoes.  It keeps for a week in the fridge. And don't throw away the milk can, wash it out and keep it to bake a mini fruit cake at Christmas.

• empty tin
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• Leftover cheese
• Soften onion and add evaporated milk
• Grated cheese
• Mix well
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A perfect way to use up all those leftover pieces of cheese in your fridge. All types of cheese can be used. It will keep for a week in the fridge and is a good vegetarian recipe.

Ingredients

225g grated cheese ( chop up cheeses that are hard to grate i.e Brie/Camembert

170g (small tin) evaporated milk

1 very small onion or 3 spring onions finely diced

1 tsp chopped chives

pinch of mustard powder

pepper

a little oil or butter for fying the onion

Method

Heat a small knob of butter or splash of oil in a saucepan and soften the chopped onion

Pour in the evaporated milk

Add the grated cheese, mustard powder and a little ground pepper

Stir well until the cheese has melted

Stir in the chopped chives

Pour into ramekins and leave to set in the fridge

Eat spread on toast or with a baked potato

This week is Zero Waste Week and we are being encouraged to reduce food waste, use up leftovers, resist BOGOF offers, reduce portion size and DON'T WASTE FOOD. So to my surprise, my daughter returned from Jamie Oliver's Feastival today with a car load of green coconuts that had been dumped by one of the food traders. We have got over two litres of coconut water and that was just one box.  And there were ten of them...

More food is wasted at Christmas than at any other time of the year.  An estimated 74 million mince pies and two million turkeys will be carted off by the dustmen. If you would like some ideas for using up leftovers, meal planning and shopping accordingly take a look at the lovefoodhatewastewebsite. This is my turkey and ham pie made from this weeks'  leftovers.