Speaker 1: Welcome to Before Breakfast, a production of iHeartRadio. Good Morning.
Speaker 1: This is Laura. Welcome to the Before Breakfast podcast. Today's
Speaker 1: tip is to cook to make leftovers. There are very
Speaker 1: few scenarios in life where it is possible to save
Speaker 1: both time and money, but by making a little extra
Speaker 1: and cooking things that keep well, it is possible to
Speaker 1: do both and perhaps even eat better than you otherwise would.
Speaker 1: Because I work from home, I am responsible for procuring
Speaker 1: my lunch each day. Going out to buy something would
Speaker 1: take a fair amount of time, ordering in would be
Speaker 1: quite expensive. I can cook, of course, but I am
Speaker 1: usually trying to cram in as much as possible before
Speaker 1: my kids get home from school. This is why I
Speaker 1: love eating leftovers. I can just heat something up quickly
Speaker 1: and I will eat something tastier than if I were
Speaker 1: eating a bowl of cereal or a peanut butter sandwich.
Speaker 1: It is also sometimes nice for dinners to cook once
Speaker 1: and then get to eat a second dinner with minimal effort.
Speaker 1: So in my house, Wednesdays in particular tend to be
Speaker 1: a night where we cook to generate a lot of leftovers. Ideally,
Speaker 1: this is something hearty like chili that can then be
Speaker 1: reheated multiple times. My lunch is for Thursday, Friday, and
Speaker 1: sometimes Saturday are then set. I also love when we
Speaker 1: manage to do something like grill a bunch of steaks
Speaker 1: on Saturday. This then can turn into dinner on Sunday
Speaker 1: with some repurposing. Cook once and eat twice or more
Speaker 1: is a great philosophy for life. This seems straightforward enough,
Speaker 1: and indeed, cook enough for leftovers is pretty common advice. However,
Speaker 1: I know many people have trouble making this work in
Speaker 1: real life. That's because cooking for leftovers does require an
Speaker 1: added level of meal and schedule planning that isn't always straightforward.
Speaker 1: Schedules can be chaotic or shift from week to week.
Speaker 1: Not all foods keep well or seem appetizing after a
Speaker 1: day or two, and judging quantities can be an uncertain business.
Speaker 1: If you make a lot of leftovers and wind up
Speaker 1: throwing them away, then you have wasted both time and money.
Speaker 1: But fortunately this planning isn't too hard. You just need
Speaker 1: to take a realistic look at your schedule and choose
Speaker 1: what you cook carefully to make sure the leftovers are
Speaker 1: palatable and can be enjoyed in various ways. First, there
Speaker 1: is schedule awareness, and not just at the day to
Speaker 1: day level. I generally look at my week and figure
Speaker 1: out which nights are going to involve lots of people
Speaker 1: eating and which are not. If my husband and I
Speaker 1: were going out for a Sunday night dinner, for instance,
Speaker 1: then it might not be worthwhile to cook extra on
Speaker 1: Saturday because the kids would be happy on Sunday with
Speaker 1: mac and cheese. If I am traveling, no one will
Speaker 1: be eating the leftovers designated for lunch. As my husband
Speaker 1: works in an office and my kids are at school.
Speaker 1: In your family too, it might be helpful to identify
Speaker 1: for which meals eating leftovers would be a good option,
Speaker 1: And when this just doesn't make sense, you can then
Speaker 1: choose which nights you will cook and how much based
Speaker 1: on there being a spot for leftovers afterwards. As then
Speaker 1: you see that Monday and Tuesday are both nights when
Speaker 1: people are home, so you plan to cook enough on
Speaker 1: Monday to mostly cover Tuesday. Or you see that you
Speaker 1: are working from home on certain days like Wednesday and Thursday,
Speaker 1: and you see that you will be home on Tuesday night,
Speaker 1: and so you will cook enough on Tuesday to cover
Speaker 1: your lunches the next two days. As for what you cook,
Speaker 1: this requires some strategy, but I think there are generally
Speaker 1: two approaches here. One is to cook something that you
Speaker 1: can eat mostly as is a second or third time.
Speaker 1: This works for things like chili or a slow cook
Speaker 1: or chicken dish that you eat with rice or something
Speaker 1: like that. These foods don't go immediately mushy as leftovers.
Speaker 1: If desired, you can eat something different for a side
Speaker 1: dish the second time if you particularly value variety. The
Speaker 1: other approach is to cook a lot of a base
Speaker 1: ingredient and then incorporate that into meals in different forms
Speaker 1: over the next few days. If you're going to try
Speaker 1: to get two dinners out of leftovers, this might be
Speaker 1: the best approach, as your crowd won't complain about getting
Speaker 1: the same dinner twice if it isn't actually the same dinner.
Speaker 1: So the other night we grilled steaks on Saturday, which
Speaker 1: we ate with veggies and baked potatoes. Then Sunday night
Speaker 1: was steak Fijeda night, wrapped in tortillas with some veggies
Speaker 1: and guacamole and salsa. The steak got it celebrated Encore.
Speaker 1: This would work with any sort of protein chicken pork,
Speaker 1: what have you. All of these could get a second
Speaker 1: life as fajitas, or with sauce and pasta, or mixed
Speaker 1: with eggs and veggies, or stir fried with veggies and
Speaker 1: topped with some sort of exciting sauce. There is a
Speaker 1: little prep work, but not a ton of prep work.
Speaker 1: Dinner is often ready in fifteen minutes in these cases.
Speaker 1: And finally, to make all this happen, you need to
Speaker 1: cook more than you need for one meal and enough
Speaker 1: to cover the additional meals the leftovers are designated for.
Speaker 1: This does involve some guessing if you don't have a
Speaker 1: career and say food service, but like anything, you can
Speaker 1: experiment here multiple teenagers in my house, so food cooking
Speaker 1: feels like an industrial process over here, and the answer
Speaker 1: is always cook more. But if you have fewer or
Speaker 1: smaller people, you can just try cooking what feels like
Speaker 1: enough for two meals and then see aim for a
Speaker 1: second meal that has got some flexibility. Something like fajitas
Speaker 1: can often be bulked up with veggies if the protein
Speaker 1: is more scant then you assumed it would be after
Speaker 1: dinner number one, And if you made more than you
Speaker 1: need for dinner number two, you could just use that
Speaker 1: as a protein in breakfast someday. When you are around
Speaker 1: people often resolve to save money and eat more healthfily
Speaker 1: in the new year. Eating leftovers can certainly help with that.
Speaker 1: You are not spending money on eating out, and if
Speaker 1: your dinners involved, say vegetables, eating leftovers for lunch means
Speaker 1: your lunch will involve vegetables, which might not have been
Speaker 1: the case at a fast food place. Eating leftovers saves
Speaker 1: time too, since you don't have to cook as often
Speaker 1: or run out to a restaurant to get a meal.
Speaker 1: But it does involve a little planning, So maybe that
Speaker 1: can be the resolution for the year. Figuring out that
Speaker 1: piece can make meals better all around. In the meantime,
Speaker 1: this is Laura. Thanks for listening, and here's to making
Speaker 1: the most of our time. Thanks for listening to Before Breakfast.
Speaker 1: If you've got questions, ideas, or feedback, you can reach
Speaker 1: me at Laura at Laura vandercam dot com. Before Breakfast
Speaker 1: is a production of iHeartMedia. For more podcasts from iHeartMedia,
Speaker 1: please visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you
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