Creative Use of Leftovers

One of the easiest ways to make a big impact on your finances is with your grocery budget. One of the best ways to make that stretch is to USE your leftovers.

Pretty much everyone knows about planned over leftovers (rubber chicken, etc), but what about those little dabs that you don't know what to do with? Let me give an example.

Sunday: you cooked fried chicken, mashed potatoes and gravy, corn on the cob and biscuits.
You have leftover 2 and 1/2 pieces of chicken, no mashed potatoes, but you do have a dab of gravy. You've got 2 corn on the cobs and 1 biscuit.

Those two whole pieces of chicken I would use to pack a lunch, but the 1/2 pc of chicken, the corn (cob and all) I would put in my creative leftover bucket (just an empty tupperware designated for holding leftovers). The biscuit I would put in my bread bag (a ziploc containing heels, biscuits, rolls, whatever non-sandwich bread item is leftover and won't be used the NEXT day). Both the "bucket" and the breadbag are in my fridge's freezer compartment. I add to them all week long and about once every two weeks I can use the contents to make something else.

You might notice I didn't save the gravy. I would send this out for scraps. Tomato sauces generally keep well, and if there are serving size amounts of spaghetti sauce, then I will save these. White sauces and gravies, however, I will make as I use them. They only take pennies to put together and it makes for a nicer finished product.

I've found that the cardinal rule of leftovers is this:

If it won't be used the NEXT day, then it will sit in the fridge until trash day

So I make a plan for each leftover item when I'm cleaning up the kitchen. Most of our leftovers are used for lunches at our house. But many times there are odds and ends that I'm not sure what to do with. But if I put them in the fridge for us to eat later, they almost always end up going to the trash when we clean out the fridge.

Anything that is a full serving, can be stored in freezer bags. We like to make individual servings for a lunch day when there aren't leftovers. This also keeps us from having the same thing for four days in a row.

Soup, chili, and casseroles are ideal for saving as "lunch menu" freezer items. Leftover rice I will also save by itself, bagging in two cup sized servings. Rice is great to add to other dishes or to pull out and use as a sidedish, if it is packaged is usable amounts.


So you have your bucket and your bread bag. What do you do with them now?

I generally will take a look at the contents and decide to do one of three options:

1. MAKE SOUP: meat of nearly any kind, assorted veggies, beans, rice, noodles...pretty much any kind of leftover you can think of can be used in a soup. Just add your liquid base (broth, cream sauce, tomato sauce or a combination. Then just add your leftovers and some fresh (or not leftover) ingredients too. Follow the ingredient list to decide how you want to season your soup. It can be zesty, savory, or have an ethnic flare. It's all up to you and the ingredients you have. Remember that corn cob? You can use the cob to flavor the soup (it's also good to flavor stocks). Just be sure that you cut off the corn to use and throw away the actual cob after the cooking and before serving.
2. MAKE A CASSEROLE: By adding rice, noodles, or anything that you can "layer" then you can make what was "leftover" new again. Make a double pie crust and add your leftovers to a creamy sauce and make a "Lotsa Pots Pie". Add eggs and cheese and make it into a quiche.
   
3. WRAP IT UP: If your leftovers are mostly beans and rice, or things that can have a Tex-Mex feel, why not wrap them up in a tortilla with some cheese and grill for a tasty sandwich type wrap. Another idea is to pick up some egg roll wrappers (they can be found in your produce section, usually with the organic food and tofu) for less than two dollars. You can season your leftovers with a theme of Asia with a little seasoning, soy sauce and rice or cabbage, or you can think outside the box and use the little wrappers on anything that you could wrap at all. I have used them with leftover chicken, cheese and rice casserole and they were delicious! Just be sure that you seal them up tight before you fry them. You can bake them too (I don't think they are quite as good though). Just be sure you let them brown on both sides.

To be truly frugal, don't forget to save your bones, celery tops, and other things that might be thought of as "waste" to use when you make your broth. A large ziploc can keep these kinds of things throughout the week. So that on kitchen prep day you can make a stockpot of broth without batting an eye.

For more frugal ideas to help you stay on your budget, please visit Crystal @ Biblical Womanhood for Frugal Friday, the blog carnival that highlights frugal tips and budget stretchers. Check it out!

How to make a Sauce

When I walk through the grocery store and take a look at the pasta aisle, it never ceases to amaze me the variety of sauces on display. I can't imagine spending $3 on jarred sauce when it is SO easy to make. I think if people realized just how simple it is, they would be making their own and saving more money.

To make any sauce there are basically four components that you can mix and match:

Oil Base-butter, oil or drippings from meat

Thickening Agent- flour if making a roux or cornstarch if you are thickening from a broth

• When making a roux, heat your oil base and then add a bit of flour to thicken, you will want to cook the flour a little bit to get rid of the "doughy" taste. Depending on the depth of the sauce you are making you may or may not want to brown the roux. Always stir constantly when making a roux, burned roux will need to be thrown out.
• When using cornstarch the rules change. While you add flour to hot oil, cornstarch ALWAYS needs to be added to cool or cold liquid. Never add to warm/hot liquid or it will not dissolve (it's backwards, I know) and you will get lumps in your sauce. I like to use a little pint jar, put a little bit of cold broth or water and add your cornstarch and shake it. You can add a bit at a time until you get the correct thickness for your sauce.
  

Liquid-there are a variety to be used here, broths, bouillon broth, milk or cream, tomato sauce or juice, even water.

Seasoning Elements-This of course is defined by the type of sauce you are making and is only limited by your imagination. Some suggestions are Meat, Cheeses, Vegetables, and spices of all types. Even sweet flavors like cocoa and coconut can be found in sauces. Flavors like onion, garlic, salt and pepper can be found in almost all sauces and if you don't want chunks of certain flavors in your sauce but want the aroma and taste, you can infuse the essence by boiling the liquid you are using with the ingredients of the flavor that you like before you begin. Just discard the ingredient after the flavor has been infused into the liquid.


Here is an example of how these steps come together. This is how I make Alfredo Sauce:

1. Melt half a stick of butter in large skillet
   
2. Throw in diced onions.
3. When onions are translucent and aromatic, throw in some flour to make roux. (hint: if you add too much flour and find your roux is a thick paste instead of a roux, just add a touch of oil. This is so simple, you can add more oil or more flour until you get the roux consistency just right)
4. Add chicken broth, then season with salt, garlic powder and pepper. Taste with small spoon to see if flavors are right.
5. Add cream or milk a bit at a time, to get the perfect consistency...the sauce will thicken as it cooks until it reaches a certain point. I just add a bit at a time until I get there.
6. Last step, add a half cup or so of Parmesan Cheese.

See how easy that is? No special ingredients, no special equipment, and no reason to ever use sauce in a jar again. It sure works for me!

To see what's working for others, please go visit Rocks In My Dryer

Make a Pizza with your kids

Fishmama over at Life As Mom is sponsoring Recipe Swap Thursday. So here is my submission for the recipe swap this week "In the Kitchen With Kids"

My kids LOVE pizza. They could eat pizza every day if I let them, but I limit it to just once a week on Fridays. Homeade pizza is so easy and quick (around 30 minutes at home too!!) that there is just no reason to go to the expense of buying Pizza Hut or even Dominoes. You can make a pizza for less than $2 or you can spend a little more on toppings and still come out ahead of buying from a pizza parlor!

For EACH pizza dough:

Dissolve
1 T yeast
in 1 c warm water

In a bowl add together:

1 t salt
1 t sugar
2 T oil
2 1/2 c flour

Add your yeast mixture (when it's sat a few minutes and is nice and foamy) to your dry ingredients. Then take your hands and mix it all up together. Knead the dough for five or ten minutes until it is nice and smooth.

Then I let the dough rest while I mix up a batch of pizza sauce.

One note on the crust. This does freeze well so if you think you might need your pizzas in LESS than 30 minutes, you can make this recipe ahead and freeze the dough. Set the dough out in your refrigerator the morning you plan on serving it and when you get home in the evening, you're ready to go!

For the pizza sauce:

1 8oz can tomato sauce
(I actually don't measure these spices...I just eyeball the amounts to about the following)
pinch of italian seasoning
t garlic powder
3/4 t onion powder
1/4 t black pepper
2t sugar

Taste the sauce and add a little bit more seasoning if you think you need to. Abby loves this part "gimme taste" she will say.
And then after tasting she'll say "it's juuuuuuuuust right!" (even if it needs more of something!)

At this point you can press your dough into a pizza pan dusted liberally with cornmeal.
I have found that you can pick up the dough and stretch it (1/4 turns at a time) to fit the pan (or just a bit larger) before you put it on the pan. Then you can take the edges and pretty them up...or just pile them into a ridge if you like.

Take the sauce and put a spoonful at 12, 3, 6 and 9'oclock and then a spoonful in the middle. Take the back of your spoon and spread the sauce in each area until you have a thin layer of sauce over your entire pizza crust.

Now you can take a bag of mozzerella cheese and sprinkle all over the pizza. It helps to tell your children to use the 12, 3, 6 and 9 o'clock areas in their mind to be sure they have equal sprinkling in all areas.

Now it's time for toppings. I have used almost every kind of topping you can think of. Kids usually like pepperoni though and it's a very inexpensive ingredient to use and easy to apply as a topping.

Now put your pizza in the oven at 450 degrees and bake for about 12-15 minutes.

An envelope system for Mother Hen's Homeade Thursday

Mother Hen at a Ship Full O' Pirates, one of my favorite blogs about living frugally as a large family has just started an link for Thursdays called Homeade Thursday. The only link up I've done so far is OrgJunkie's Mealplanning Monday (which is easy for me because, lets face it...I'm a meal planner!) but I can't wait to make this link up with Mother Hen my next adventure in blogging!

The directive is to tell about something homeade and do it on Thursday. It can be something made, cooked, anything you like, the way I understand it. It just has to be homeade. She also would like clear directions and pictures. Unfortunately, I think Shelby has misplaced my camera cord. I can't find it anywhere since she last put our pictures on the computer. Ah Oh! So my entry this week will have to be without my own pictures. I just tried to think of a project where I could borrow pictures to illustrate the points instead of taking them of my own project. I'll try to get that cord and have my own pictures next week!

I LOVE LOVE LOVE Dave Ramsey and would love to have his deluxe envelope system but it sells for $19.95 and we just do not have that kind of money while we are still on BS#2 (paying off debt).



So I searched around until I found something that would work for us but yet, is still in our budget.

What I found is such a simple solution and actually I think I like it even better than the Dave Ramsey envelope systems! I purchased a simple (purse sized) binder for less than $2 similar to this, but mine has a velcro flap to keep it closed:




As for the dimensions of the binder, think purse-sized planner size.

Then, at the dollar store, I found little neoprene pencil pouches (just a tad larger than an actual dollar bill...so the perfect size) for $1 each.



They came in all different colors, brights or pastels and some really funky patterns too. I chose one pouch for each envelope budgeted. Total investment was less than $8...well over half what I would have paid for Dave's and no shipping charge either. Use a hole punch to make the holes in the correct places and walah, discounted homeade (but still pretty nifty) envelope system.


Alot of you might be asking, why not just use a coupon holder? I had one of those onhand and tried it. What I found is that the change all falls to the bottom, so if you want to know exact amounts, like I do, or worry about your coins flying around and sneaking out, this pouch system is better. You might also wonder, why not just hole punch some actual envelopes? That's pretty much what Dave's system is, an actual manilla envelope in a pretty leather wallet, but I think I like the sturdiness of the neoprene to hold my money in. While my little binder doesn't have the little slots for my debit card or a coin purse, I just made a paisley patterned pouch hold my checkbook, debit card (just one) and anything else I would want...it's my actual wallet part of the wallet system. The best part of my system versus Daves is that I can put the whole binder in my purse, or I can carry just one element at a time...the individual pouches can be added or taken out of the binder as needed.

While it's not exactly totally homeade. I think that this "semi homeade" project definately follows the criteria of Mother Hen's Thursday project. For frugal families, we have to find that compromise between what we want and what will fit our needs. With a little ingenuity and creativity on our part, we might like our homeade version even BETTER!!

Happy Thursday!