Saturday 14 November 2015

Using up Leftovers


This mornings glance into the fridge revealed lots of dishes containing leftovers. 

 I usually make a big pot of soup to use up the end of the week vegetables, but this week we seemed to have dishes of things on the shelves and in the drawers all the veggies were in perfectly good shape to last us all through next week.

So I switched tack and pulled out the bowl with the tuna, the bowl with the sweet potato and the one with the ordinary potatoes that were over from my tea the other night.  Of course on the work top there were eggs, there are nearly always eggs ... thanks girls ..... and realising we needed something with flavour I went over to the polytunnel and pulled up the fattest of the Spring Onions, they weren't really that fat , but their flavour is brilliant so they would be enough.

All these things (except the egg) were chopped up a bit more and mixed together with a sprinkle of dried herbs to add even more flavour., and then with wet hands shaped into four fish cakes.  I didn't need anything wet to add to the mixture as it held together perfectly, but if I had I would have added a little bit of egg.


Then I set up the production line, it takes just minutes to turn naked fish cakes into breadcrumb covered delights.  First a roll in the flour, then a quick dunk all over in the beaten egg and then finally a plonk, roll and turn in the breadcrumbs ....


... which were themselves leftovers back in September.  

I'm not sure if the date on the tub says Sept 13 or Sept 15, either way the breadcrumbs have been frozen since the day they were blitzed and they were absolutely fine.


I like the chunkiness of these breadcrumbs they will turn lovely and crispy when the fishcakes finally make it into the oven later on today, I must remember to blitz them only to this level next time I'm processing stale bread.  I always leave fish cakes or homemade burgers to rest in the fridge before cooking them, and anyway having them ready to use later means that the whole meal will seem more like an instant supper than having to spend too long in the kitchen to produce it when I might be tired or hungry.

What will be having with them, well on my search of the fridge shelves I spied a tub with about a cupful of Faux Ratatouille (no Aubergine), so I will cook a handful of  penne pasta and mix the two together and it will make a lovely side to go with the fish cakes.

All in all a good homemade 'fridge clutter busting' meal :-)

What's on your menu tonight ?

Sue xx

15 comments:

  1. Good job with using your leftovers, Sue.

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  2. Good job on the waste not, want not.

    God bless.

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  3. Huge would have been proud of you Sue , I can't understand why people are wasting so much, they don't have any imagination or just can't be bothered x

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  4. For lunch, I had some cold new potatoes left over from the WI lunch I catered, with some green beans from the same place. I added to that, a bit of smoked mackerel, a pot of creamy dressing from a kebab NH had last night, and the pot of salad from the same place. I know kebabs aren't frugal, but we don't need to budget hard anymore, and we don't!
    There is still some chicken casserole left from the WI lunch, I have my eye on it for tonight. We had it straight last night, but I'm thinking of turning it into soup for tonight

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  5. No lie, I made something similar to this all week but I used leftover chicken bits and millet flour and leftover hydrated millet. Made the yummiest cakes. Then I did one with sardines because I was out of tuna. Delicious way to eat up all kinds of bits.

    Have a great weekend and boogie boogie.

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  6. I love good leftover meal. Ours was a made up curry, yummy. xx

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  7. I had Bubble & Squeak with added chopped onions, along with Pork & Apple sausages (2 left over from a pack of 6 that has contributed to 3 meals now) plus a smallish Yorkshire Pudding from batter made yesterday for pancakes (the grandchildren were here for their tea! Leftovers often make the tastiest meals!

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  8. I love a fridge bottom meal, it seems free and because it takes a bit of effort it is always super tasty.

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  9. Like Pam I love leftovers. I think some foods taste better when they're left for a day or two. One example would be curry. I call them my hodge podge meals.

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  10. Hello Sue, thank you for your chutney recipe. Pleased to say that it was a huge success and I've made several jars of chutney. They should be ready just in time for Christmas. It was a great way to use up all the apples I've been given recently. The beetroot and chocolate cake was also a success and I boiled the rest of the beetroot to eat with salads and lunches (the beetroot was also given to me). Now I'm trying to use up a whole red cabbage I picked up on yellow sticker for 4p. We had home made coleslaw tonight (I saved one of the donated apples to grate and add to it). Thrifty eating x

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  11. Those look tasty. I don't freeze my breadcrumbs, but dry them to crispy and long-keeping and have them in a glass jar, ready to use. I think my favourite fishcakes, are ones made with smoked haddock or cod. Yummm.

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  12. They look very nice. I never have any bread crumbs so I can't freeze them.

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  13. My made up meals for our dinner tonight were 3 different kinds of quiches, all using left over veggies, mushrooms and ham bits. We augmented with salad stuff, a little farmhouse pate, pickles and crusty, home made bread on the side.

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  14. Usually at first it seems that there is nothing to eat. Than you take all leftovers from your fridge and find out that it is enough to eat at least two days))

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