Marissa Vicario

La La Leftovers

I love leftovers because they force me to get creative and try new recipes and they make for quick and easy meals. Cook once, eat two or three times!

My boyfriend is traveling for work (again) so I’m eating for one this week and after Sunday’s stuffed peppers, I had some leftover stuffing which led me on a search for how to use it. Turns out, I had a quick and easy recipe for stuffed chard leaves and coincidentally I had picked up some Swiss Chard this weekend so I was set.

While the recipe had its own stuffing, I substituted my previously made stuffing (see previous post for stuffed pepper recipe). All that was left to do was preheat the oven to 350 and wash and dry the chard leaves. I spooned a couple of spoonfuls of stuffing onto the leaves and folded the sides in to create little packets then laid them in a baking pan seam side down. The recipe gives the option of pouring tomato sauce over the stuffed leaves which I thought sounded good, but I opted not to tonight. I love adding and omitting ingredients from recipes to suit my tastes and the ingredients I have in my kitchen. How do you customize your favorite recipes?
 
While the chard leaves baked for 30 minutes, I snuck in an hour of sweaty yoga (more on my yoga practice in a future post). When yoga was over dinner was ready and I was really pleased with the result. It was a perfect way to use my leftovers and also get some greens onto my dinner plate.
Speaking of leftovers, whenever I make brown rice, I always make more than I need. Why? Brown rice is, in my opinion, one of the most versatile leftover foods and it keeps in the refrigerator for a few days. It also freezes well in small batches. Here are a couple of ideas (recipes included) for how to use leftover brown rice:
Breakfast Porridge
Prep Time: 5 minutes
Cooking Time: 15 minutes
Yields: 3 servings
Ingredients: 2 cups leftover brown rice ¼ cup water, rice milk or coconut water
1 tablespoon maple syrup
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
Pinch of sea salt
1 apple, peeled and diced
Directions:
  1. Add rice, liquid, maple syrup, cinnamon and salt to a pan and cook over medium-low heat.
  2. Add apple and mix well.
  3. Bring mixture to a boil, then reduce heat to low and simmer.
  4. Continue cooking for about 10 minutes or until the apple is soft.
  5. Enjoy hot.
Notes:
  • You can use any leftover grain in place of the rice.

Easy Fried Rice

Prep Time: 10 minutes
Cooking Time: 20 minutes (if using leftover rice)
Yields: 8 servings
Ingredients: 1 small onion, chopped
1 tablespoon olive oil
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 carrot, diced
½ bunch scallion, chopped
1 tablespoon ginger, grated
4 cups cooked long grain brown rice
2 tablespoons tamari soy sauce
1 teaspoon toasted sesame oil
Directions:
  1. Sauté onion in olive oil for 5 minutes.
  2. Add garlic and carrot and sauté for 4 minutes.
  3. Add scallion and ginger and sauté for about 4 more minutes.
  4. Add rice and sprinkle with water to give extra steam to dish.
  5. Add tamari soy sauce and toasted sesame oil.
  6. Lower heat and cool for 5 minutes more, stirring occasionally.
Notes:
  • Beat an egg together with the tamari and sesame oil. Pour this mixture into the pan and move it around quickly with fork to spread egg as it cooks.

How do you like to use your leftovers?

P.S.Sorry everyone but the other photos I took for this post didn’t save as expected 🙁 You’ll have to use your imagination just for today.

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