Tis the Season.. for Leftovers!

We eat a lot of casserole in this house.  It's an inexpensive way to get maximum value from your food dollar.  And as a bonus, the kids love anything with noodles and cheese melted on top.  But at work the other day the conversation in the #EQ2 channel turned to pot pie, and I decided to shake up those casserole fixings.

Leftover Pot Pie isn't terribly different from Leftover Casserole, except you need a larger quantity of leftovers to fill the pie.  And of course, no noodles (although I suppose you could do noodle pie if you were on a carbohydrate binge).  Here's the pot pie I made the other night.  Mix and match whatever you have with a cream soup and leftover gravy.  This was a deep-dish pie and I probably used five or six cups of filling.

Leftover Casserole

The filled pie, ready to bake

1 cup frozen peas, thawed
1 cup frozen corn, thawed
1 cup frozen carrots
10 tater tots, cooked and cut in thirds
2 cups cooked turkey,  cut bite-sized
1 can Cream of Mushroom Soup
1/2 cup chicken gravy
2 Pilsbury Pie Crusts

Follow the instructions on the pie crusts - they need to come to room temperature before you unroll them.  Pre-heat oven to 425°F.

In a large bowl, stir together all ingredients except pie crusts.  Season to taste.  Add water if necessary; the consistency should be gravy-like unless you want it sloppier.  Unroll one pie crust into a 9" deep-dish pie pan.  Spoon filling evenly into the pie pan.  Unroll the second pie crust and place it over the filled pie. Cut, crimp, or pinch the crusts together to seal.  Cut four slits in the top crust to vent.

I recommend you bake the pot pie on a baking sheet in case of spills.  Bake at 425°F for 15 minutes, then reduce the heat to 350°F and bake 20 more minutes.

Let cool 5 minutes before serving. Makes 8 healthy slices.

Leftovers

When you're on a budget and really pinching pennies you don't throw any food out.  Of course, then your fridge fills up with lots of little containers with not enough of one thing to do anything with.  What to do?  Here's a couple of things that I do to get another meal or two out of leftovers.  The basic idea is to take a little bit of something and make it something new while using it up. 

Leftover Casserole:  This is really easy.  Just take your basic casserole formula and throw in all your leftovers.  Rice, macaroni and cheese, veggies, all that stuff.  Cut any leftover meats up bite-sized and add those (you really need only a cup or so of chopped cooked meat).  You can slice up hot dogs, crumble burgers, strip the meat of chicken wings.  Cook enough noodles to fill up a casserole dish with all the leftovers, and stir in a can of cream-of-something soup and enough milk or water to get the consistency you like.  If it the combination doesn't seem tasty, try adding cheese (I'll layer American Cheese slices into the casserole, the kids will eat anything with cheese on it).  Bake at 350F until hot through, probably about a half an hour.

Bits and Gravy:  I keep a large container of Tone's Brown Gravy mix around just for this and dishes like it. Chop up leftover steak, roast, or even burger into bite sized-pieces. Meanwhile, make two cups of brown gravy and enough rice for healthy portions.  Toss the meat in the gravy as it thickens.  Add mushrooms for fancy.  Serve it over the rice, with veggies on the side.  Yum!

Bento:  Pikko and her fans from AIBento will no doubt chuckle at me, but I make leftovers into bento too.  Okay, it's really just Americanized Asian food in a Glad box, but that's lunch, right?  If the basic dinner is meat, rice, and veggies, I always make extra rice.  Fill a two-cup plastic container (I really like the Glad ware) 2/3 full of rice.  Add bite-sized leftover meat and veggies and top with a couple tablespoons of your favorite Asian-type sauce.  I've done it with Kung Pao sauce, Thai peanut sauce, teriyaki, and just plain soy. I'm sorry, I ate my leftover pork tenderloin Kung Pao before I took a picture!