The best part of a turkey dinner is the leftovers, right? Well, without the extended family to share in the big meal, there’s a lot more leftovers. So after three courses of turkey dinner and several rounds of sandwiches, it was starting to feel like Groundhog Day rather than Thanksgiving or Christmas. So we had to think of more creative things to do with our turkey leftovers…
After finishing the green beans, we used the leftover Hollandaise on poached eggs at breakfast for the next two days. After running out of sandwich-worthy turkey, we took the smaller bits and combined them with carrots, onions & celery bits with a frozen pie crust and made a savory turkey pie…
Final product with a side of au gratin potatoes (thanks to Hungary Jack!)…
Day 4 – Turkey and chicken tacos for lunch (not pictured), followed by turkey and chicken Caesar salad for dinner. We added some frozen spinach and filo to create “spanikopita” style pockets for a change of pace. We didn’t have any feta cheese, so we just used some diced onions, cream cheese and shredded cheese, added 1/2 a can of artichoke hearts (we threw the rest in the salad) and made a filling which we wrapped in some thawed filo and brushed with some butter…
By day five, the family was begging for something other than turkey. So we used the instant pot to turn the bones and remaining bits into turkey broth/soup base and froze it, anticipating a return to turkey in a few days. We made a big lasagne (turkey free!) and ate that for a two days before thawing the soup base for the last hurrah of turkey dinner…
Our 8 year old proposed that I teach her to cook as part of our challenge. My husband agreed that this was a great idea – for ALL our kids. He is now a good cook, but he started off behind the curve, having graduated college without ever learning to make spaghetti or use an oven. So moving forward, we assigned each child a night every week that he/she is responsible for dinner. That includes creating a menu, preparing the meal and cleaning as you go (also a key skill). Our youngest went first and used the last bits of turkey in the fridge and some supplemental chicken to make taco salads (not pictured). Our eldest took the next night. I reminded her that she had to use what we had – no grocery run – and suggested looking at our family recipe book which often has some favorites with less ingredients (many of which can be substituted). I also was really pushing the turkey soup base as a main ingredient…
What she picked was a recipe from my childhood that I haven’t made in years – Beer Cheese Soup and Beer Bread. We had three beers left in the fridge, enough for the soup and two loaves of bread. We added the ingredients to the soup base, including leftover veggies from the turkey pie, substituted canned cheddar soup for Cheese Whiz, finished off some Velveeta from the back of the fridge and supplemented with some extra shredded cheese (to make up for the shortage of Velveeta). My daughter repeatedly exiled me from the kitchen every time I tried to wander in and help. She did a terrific job and made a fantastic meal…
We’ve now had two rounds of soup, so I’m getting ready to freeze the rest (probably two more meals) and have moved on to holiday ham (Happy Easter!). We normally have a huge Easter brunch with our family and friends, so this year is definitely strange. We bought the ham, because you can only buy 2 meat items (and a ham seemed smart/economical), and cooking the ham for Easter felt festive/sentimental. But after cooking it in my pajamas today, and not having any company to eat it, I realized a few things: 1. That is a lot of ham. 2. I think our guests usually eat most of the ham. 3. I don’t really like ham that much, and that is A LOT of ham…
I do like having little mini-tubs of diced ham in the freezer to add to eggs, quiches, soups and of course our favorite family breakfast recipe, “Ramones” (named after my Granny K, Ramona, who always made them). Simple, cheap, delicious, filling: Ramen noodles sauteed with diced onion, peppers, ham and topped with poached eggs and cheese. One of my former colleagues renamed them “Ramen Surprise” (which is now what my kids call them). During breakfast, he suddenly turned his fork over and commented, “Wait a minute, is this ramen noodles? I thought it was potatoes, but it’s Ramen… SURPRISE!”
So I’m already scheming on what to make with ham this week. I guess we’ll see… Happy Easter everyone!
Pantry of Creativity 