The Thrifty Cookbook: 476 Ways to Eat Well With Leftovers (46 page)

Meatballs in broth (see
pages 66
-
7
).

Meatballs with pizza (see
pages 126
-
8
).

Slice leftover meatballs into a pitta bread sandwich with a great dollop of mayonnaise or hummus.

A couple of leftover meatballs can successfully be whizzed up into a soup for one, with the addition of a ladleful of good stock (see
pages 28
-
9
).

Frying pans or woks are brilliant for swiftly heating up leftover food. Think about leftover potatoes, fried with butter and garlic, or French beans tossed in hot oil with the last couple of rashers of bacon, and you get the idea. These are dishes that can be as simple or as complex as you like, using whatever needs to be cooked
tonight
with the added companionship of fresh herbs, a few spices or a bit of store-cupboard imagination.

This is not necessarily food that looks picture-perfect. But there’s something about the idea of using only one big, broad pan that sits really happily with the whole business of leftover cooking – rustic, full of flavour and completely unassuming.

When it comes to the wok, I’ve described only two processes here – one for vegetables and one for meat. Once you’ve got these taped, you should feel confident on your own, even if, to start with, the very idea of a wok sends you cowering behind the kitchen table. You could stick to a large frying pan even for stir-fry recipes, though the good thing about woks – and you can get small, light ones that don’t take up loads of cupboard room – is that they heat up food incredibly efficiently and fast.

The French word
hacher
means to chop, or mince, and that says it all: hashes are unholy mixtures of meat and/or vegetables chopped and fried together in a wide pan. Brilliantly tasty, simple and cheap, and practically invented for leftovers and fridge clearouts.

This is one of the quintessential British leftover ‘recipes’. It is a dish that can be made in tens of different ways according to what you have left over. At its heart are cabbage and potato, staples for British labourers since the seventeenth century. The exact proportion of potato to vegetable doesn’t really matter.

It’s very good as an accompaniment to sausages or bacon and egg. In fact, a fried or poached egg sitting astride freshly made bubble and squeak is Sunday brunch heaven. This recipe and all the variations that follow are perfect served with Tomato Chutney (
page 43
), Chilli Jam (
page 45
) or Onion Marmalade (
page 42
).

Serves 2

2 tablespoons oil, dripping or butter

1 onion, finely chopped

4-5 teacups mashed potatoes, or coarsely grated or crumbled cold boiled potatoes

about 2 teacups cooked cabbage

salt and pepper

Heat half the oil or fat in a large frying pan, add the onion and cook gently until soft.

Mix the potatoes and cabbage together in a bowl, add the onion and season with salt and pepper.