What to with leftover dip...

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I love the Superbowl- not necessarily for the football but because of all the wonderful leftovers you can use in recipes afterwards!  Here's one for your leftover bits of dip.  I used a ranch dip in our Crescent Cups but you can use dill, french onion, bacon cheddar or what every kind of dip you have leftover and your family loves.  Enjoy!

Ham and Broccoli Crescent Cups
Ingredients:
1 Cup Chopped Ham
1 Cup Chopped Broccoli, cooked
3 TBSP Dip (ranch, dill, french onion, bacon cheddar, etc.)
1 Egg
1/2 Cup Shredded Cheddar Cheese
1 Tube Crescent Rolls

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees.  Mix together ham, broccoli, dip, egg, and cheddar cheese in a large mixing bowl.

2. Spray a 12 muffin, regular size muffin pan with Pam.  Unroll crescent rolls.  Take each triangle, and make it into a triangular cup (see picture, use long perforated side to join together).  Place into muffin pan.  Fill with ham and broccoli mix. 

3. Bake at 375 for 14 to 15 minutes.  Let sit for 5 minutes to set before serving.  Makes 8 Cups.

What to do with leftover spaghetti and fried okra?

My mom is semi-Southern, so, we grew up eating fried okra.  For us, it was a treat when my mom would take the time to cook this Southern delicacy.  Although, I have battered and fried okra by hand, I am lucky enough to be able to buy it in the grocery store.  I love it when it is on sale for $1 a bag.  While I think fried okra is simply delicious, I was very surprised to find out that my children aren't as thrilled about it (although they both tried it for me!).  With all this fried okra leftover, I seriously thought I might have to throw it out, but then I got to thinking.  I hid it in this Cajun Spaghetti that went over extremely well with my husband and father.  Enjoy the recipe, it's spaghetti with a twist!

Cajun Spaghetti
Ingredients:
1/2 Cup Diced Onions
2 Celery Stalks, Chopped
1 TBSP Minced Garlic
2 Chorizo Sausage Links
1 Brat or Smoked Sausage
1/2 Cup Chopped Ham
1 Diced Tomato
1 Cup Fried Okra
I Can Diced Tomatoes
1 & 1/2 Cups Spaghetti Sauce
1 Cup Water
1 TBSP Creole Seasoning
4 Cups Cooked Pasta

1. In a large soup pot, saute diced onions, celery and minced garlic in a little olive oil for 5 minutes. 
2. When celery turns bright green add chorizo (decased and crumbled).  Cook for another 5 minutes.  Add smoked sausage, ham, tomato, fried okra, diced tomatoes, spaghetti sauce, water, and creole seasoning.  Simmer on  high for 10 minutes. 
3.  Turn to low and mix pasta in.  Cook until pasta is thoroughly heated.  Serves 6 people.

What to do with leftover pork chops?

Sometimes I look in my pantry and refrigerator and think, "I have no idea what to make for dinner."  Usually if I stand there long enough, something catches my eye and voila, I know what we're having.  If you're having one of those days, here's an easy soup recipe for you to make :)  Serve it with a salad and warm garlic bread and you have a great meal.  Plus you'll probably have some leftovers to freeze for another one of those days when you're at a loss as to what to make.

3 Bean Soup
Ingredients:
1 Can Tomato Soup
4 Cans of Beans (I used red, black & butter)
Lg Can (28oz) Crushed Tomatoes
2 Cups Water
1 Cup Chopped Ham
2 Cooked Pork Chops, Chopped
1/2 Large Onion, Chopped
1 and 1/2 TBSP Minced Garlic
1 TBSP Onion Soup Mix
1 Tsp Salt
Grated Cheddar Cheese

1.  Pour all ingredients except cheese into a slow cooker.  Cook on low for 4 to 6 hours until soup thickens up.  Stir every so often, so soup won't burn.
2  When finished, top with grated cheese and serve.  Serves 6 to 8.

What to do with leftover pesto dip and lunch meat?

Happy rainy Monday!

Last weekend we had a really fun engagement party for my sister Jen and her fiance Austin.  As with most parties, there was a ton of food leftover.  Lucky for us, my mom brought a whole bunch of the leftovers to my house.  Jen had made this really fantastic tasting, simple to make, Pesto Dip for the party.  I added some half and half to it to turn it into a creamy dressing for a pasta salad. The pasta salad can be served warm or cold, depending upon what your family likes.  Here's the dip recipe, plus the Pesto Pasta Salad recipe.  This way you can plan your leftover meal in advance!  Enjoy!

Jen's Pesto Dip
Ingredients:
Half a Jar of Pesto
1/2 cup (or so) chopped roasted red pepper
1 Bar of Cream Cheese
3/4 Cup Chopped Walnuts

Combine pesto and cream cheese, add peppers and walnuts.
Serve with crackers or french bread

Pesto Pasta Salad
Ingredients:
1 and 1/8 Cup of Pesto Dip
3/8 Cup Half & Half
1 TBSP Dried Minced Onion
4 Cups Cooked Pasta
3 Roma Tomatoes, Chopped
2 oz Mozzarella Cheese (shredded or cubed)
1/2 Cup Turkey or Ham Lunchmeat, Chopped
2 and 1/2 Cups Cooked Cauliflower, Chopped*

1. Mix together pesto dip, half & half and minced onion until creamy.
2. In large bowl, stir together cooked pasta, tomatoes, mozzarella cheese, lunchmeat and cauliflower.  Pour dressing on top and mix.

*If your family does not like cauliflower, substitute 2 and 1/2 cups of peas and chopped green peppers.

What to do with Cherry Coke Zero?

Andy's Granny came into town tonight.  I've known about this visit for weeks, but I still hadn't pre-thought dinner.  After work, I ran home before picking up Celia and Charlie to fix something really quickly.  Luckily, I had a whole ham thawed out.  My friend Leighanne had given me a 2 liter of Cherry Coke Zero the other night.  I looked at the ham, I looked at the soda and I thought hmmmm....

Baked Ham and Sweet Carrots
Ingredients:
1 Ham (mine was 6lbs)
1 Pound of Carrots
1 Medium Onion
3/4 Cup of Cherry Coke Zero (or regular Cherry Coke)
1/4 Cup Jelly (use a berry or grape based jelly, I used black currant jelly)

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
2. Put ham in a large roasting pan.
3. Peel and chop carrots and onion into large chunks.  Put around ham.
4. In a separate bowl, whisk together jelly and Cherry Coke Zero.  Pour over ham and veggies when finished.
5. Bake in the oven for 1 and 1/2 to 2 hours.  Dish is finished when carrots are tender.

What to do with ham and plain yogurt?

I love when the unexpected turns out great.  Yesterday Andy and I wanted to have an easy dinner without a lot of fuss.  He was talking about Taco Bell, but I had just gone major grocery shopping the other day.  Plus, ever since we've made friends with our neighbor Mathilde, Taco Bell just doesn't sound that great.  Mathilde's authentic Mexican food is to die for!  So I talked Andy out of Taco Bell and set out to make something easy.  I knew I needed to use up some ham, but I was tired of my regular leftover ham recipes.  Instead, I looked around and came up with this curry noodle dish.  It was amazing: one of the best pastas I've ever made and oh so simple.  The egg noodles have great substance and the scent of the curry powder will make your house smell great!  If you want yours to have a little more bite, add some red pepper to your dish.  Enjoy!

Curry Noodles with Summer Squash
Ingredients:
8 oz Egg Noodles*
2 Cups Chopped Ham
1 Medium Yellow Squash
1 Medium Zucchini
1 and 1/2 Cups Water
1 TBSP Dried Minced Onion
1/2 TBSP Curry Powder
1 and 1/2 TBSP Cream Cheese
3 Oz Plain Yogurt
2 Chopped Roma Tomatoes

1. Put water in a medium sized soup pan on stove top and bring to a boil.
2. While water is starting to boil, chop ham, squash and zucchini.  Put in a separate medium sized soup pan.  Add water, dried onion, cream cheese, yogurt and curry powder to pan.  Turn heat on high right before putting egg noodles into boiling water.   Bring to a boil and turn down to medium heat.  Continue stirring while cooking so sauce won't burn on the bottom.
3. Follow directions on egg noodles.  Cook until al dente.  When finished cooking, drain water and put back into pan. Turn stove off under noodles.
4. Right before mixing sauce in with noodles, take out a large spoon full of sauce and mix a teaspoon of flour with liquid to form a paste.  Pour paste back into sauce and bring sauce to a boil, stirring frequently.  (This will thicken your sauce up a bit.)  Pour sauce over noodles, turn heat back on and bring to a boil, stirring.  Turn off heat and let sit covered for 5 to 10 minutes.

* I used specialty, dried egg noodles (from Aldis).  If you don't have these, I reccomend the type you buy from the freezer.

What to do with ham and grits?

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Believe it or not, we made it to sunrise service on Easter.  We woke up with 5 minutes to spare, went in our pajamas and got to be part of a lovely service!  After, we went to Cracker Barrel for breakfast.  I love the CB- what a great idea, shopping and eating!  Andy, for this very same reason, doesn't care for it very much.  We had an awesomly filling breakfast that included grits.  I am not a big fan of grits.  I know there are many ways you can fancy them up, but to me they taste like baby cereal.  I just don't get it.  However, I was bound and determined that our grits would not go to waste.  Two nights later, all of our grits were used up in this deliciously easy, stuffed corn bread.  I haven't seen Celia eat something so fast in a long time!  If you want to spice it up a bit, add a small can of green chiles on top of the ham.  Enjoy!

Stuffed Cornbread
Ingredients:
1 Box Cornbread Mix
3 Jumbo Eggs (or 4 medium eggs)
3/4 Cup Cooked Grits
1/2 Cup Milk
1 TBSP of Mayonnaise
4 Slices American Cheese (or 1/2 to 1 Cup Shredded Cheese)
1 Cup Chopped Ham

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
2. In a large bowl, mix together cornbread, eggs, grits, mayo and milk.  Make sure you break up your grits.
3. Spray a deep-dish pie pan with non-stick spray.

4. Pour half of batter into pie pan.  Lay cheese on top of batter.  Sprinkle ham on top of cheese.  Pour other half of batter on top of ham.
5. Bake in the oven for 25 to 30 minutes.  When finished, the top should be golden and cracking, the bottom should be light brown.

What to do with ham and green peppers?

Who would have thought?  This is what I asked myself when our ham and chicken kabobs turned out absolutely delicious tonight!  I love ham, but I've never bar-b-qued it.  However, we have a lot of ham.  A couple of weeks ago, hams were on sale at our local grocery store and I bought a huge one!  It was so big that I cut it in half and froze half of it.  Earlier today, I took out some chicken to cook tonight, but my thighs didn't thaw out, only the two boneless breasts did.  Needless to say, when I went to make these Asian Kabobs for dinner tonight, I had to improvise.  Lucky for us and all our What's for Leftovers' readers, they turned out to be some of the best kabobs I have ever made!  Feel free to use whatever veggies you have on hand.  I used our last turnip, which actually turned out to be really good as a kabob veggie.  I hope you can get out and enjoy the nice Spring weather and bbq these kabobs some time soon!

Asian Kabobs
Ingredients for the Kabobs:
1/2 Large Red Onion
1 Medium Yellow Onion
2 Green Peppers
2 Colored Peppers (I used red and yellow)
1 Turnip
2 Boneless, Skinless Chicken Breasts, Cut into Chunks

15 Large Chunks of Ham

1. Soak your kabob sticks in water so they won't catch on fire on the bbq pit.
2. Cut up vegetables and meat into large chunks.
3. Load up six kabobs sticks with the vegetables.  Load up four more with the meat, rotating ham and chicken. 

Ingredients for the Sauce:
1 Cup Red Sweet n' Sour Sauce
1 Cup BBQ Sauce
1/4 Cup Honey
1/4 Cup Soy Sauce
1 TBSP Minced, Refrigerated Garlic

1. Mix all ingredients together and divide into two bowls.
2. Baste both sides of veggies kabobs with sauce in one bowl.  If there is sauce left, pour over veggies.  Then baste both sides of meat kabobs with sauce in the other bowl.  If there is sauce left, pour over meat.
3. Cook kabobs on bbq grill over medium-low heat.  Make sure chicken is finished cooking before removing from heat.

What to do with leftover broccoli and potatoes?

Good Morning What's for Leftovers Readers!  We have had a very busy weekend.  Our children went out of town because Andy had to play the piano in our friends' wedding.  So needless to say, there was not a lot of time for leftover cooking.  Because of this, I made sure to make a dish last Thursday to post this Sunday.  It was a breakfast quiche for the guys at Andy's shop for lunch.  It was a big hit judging by the empty pie dish that came home with Andy that night.  Quiche filling is one of the easiest food items to prepare, but the crust, unless you use a store-bought one, is a little more time consuming.  Since I was in hurry, and I didn't have any ready-made pie crusts, I used baking potatoes as my crust.  This was so simple, plus it made the dish a little healthier.  I love to sneak vegetables in my recipes whenever I can!  Let me know if you have any questions.

Ham and Potato Quiche
Ingredients:
2 Medium Baking Potatoes

1 Cup Chopped Broccoli
1 Cup Diced Ham
1/4 Cup Diced Red Bell Pepper
1/3 Cup Mayonnaise
6 Eggs
1/3 Cup Milk
1 1/2 Cups Shredded Colby Cheese

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Spray a glass bottom pie pan.
2. Peel baking potatoes.  Cut in half and thinly slice.  Layer potato slices on bottom of pie pan.
3. Layer chopped broccoli, ham, and bell peppers on top of potato slices.

4. In a blender or Magic Bullet, whip together mayo, eggs and milk until creamy and frothy.  When finished, gently pour over vegetables.
5. Bake in the oven for 30 minutes.  After 30 minutes add cheese to the top of the quiche and bake for another 15 minutes.  When finished, the bottom of the quiche should be light brown and the cheese should be completely melted and bubbly.

What to do with leftover bratwursts and canned corn?

The sun is shining, the birds are singing and Spring is in the air- hopefully!  It's a perfect day for cajun food!  Okay, any day is a perfect day for cajun food.  I myself have never been to New Orleans, but my husband Andy has for Mardi Gras.  According to him, Mardi Gras is crazy and the food is great.  He loves cajun food, so he was a big fan of this dish!  From start to finish, it will take you less than an hour, and you can feed a crowd of 5-7 adults with it.  Serve some toasty french bread on the side and you'll have a feast!

Cajun Rice

Ingredients:

1 Box Red Beans and Rice

1 Small Onion

1 Green Pepper

1 Orange, Yellow, or Red Pepper

1/4 Cup Canned Corn (this is all I had, you can add more)

2 Bratwursts

1 Cup Chopped Ham

1 TBSP Garlic
1 Can Tomato Soup
1 Can Diced Tomatoes
1 1/2 Cans of Water (use the diced tomatoes can)

1. Dice onion, green pepper, and colored pepper. Put into a large soup pot with red beans and rice mix.
2. Cut up brats into small pieces.  Add brats and ham cubes to pot.
3. Add garlic, tomato soup, diced tomatoes (with juice) and water to the pot.  Mix all ingredients together.
4. Cook covered, on high until rice mix comes to a boil.  Stir occasionally so the bottom won't burn.
5. After rice starts to boil, turn heat down to medium and cook covered for 20 minutes.  Continue stirring occasionally so rice won't burn on the bottom.
6.  After 20 minutes, uncover and turn off stove.  Let sit for ten minutes to thicken up and cool.

What to do with ham and potatoes?

Happy Anniversary What's for Leftovers? readers!  It's been one month since our blog was started!  I have really enjoyed sharing my recipes with everybody and I love reading your comments.  I look forward to more cooking suggestions and ideas from you!  To celebrate, Andy and I are taking our little ones to McDonalds tonight and not cooking.  So tomorrow night, tune in for leftover McDonalds :) 

Since today is rainy and cozy, I made my family Cheesy Ham and Potato Soup for lunch.  It made our house smell great while I was cooking it and then it tasted delicious when we ate it.  Plus, I was able to use up the rest of the ham my mom and dad had bought me from the Amish store at the Lake of the Ozarks.  After the soup was done cooking, the cheese separated from the broth a bit.  When I make this soup again, I'll make a paste out of a little bit of broth and flour.  I'll mix it into the soup and bring it to a boil.  This should make it a little bit thicker and help with the problem of separating.  If you make the soup and include this step, let me know how it turns out.

Cheesy Ham and Potato Soup
Ingredients:
4 Medium Baking Potatoes
3 Medium Carrots
1/2 Cup Choppped Yellow Onion
1 Cup Ham Chunks
1 Can Chicken Broth (I used reduced sodium/fat-free)
1 Can  Evaporated Milk (I used fat-free)
1/2 Cup Water
Salt
Pepper
1 Cup Shredded Colby Jack Cheese

Peel and chop potatoes and carrots.  Put potatoes, carrots, and onions into a medium-sized soup pot.  Add ham, chicken broth, evaporated milk and water.  Start cooking on high.  Stir frequently, so milk won't burn.  After soup starts to boil, turn burner down to medium and cook for 30 minutes.  Continue stirring frequently so soup won't boil over or burn.  After 30 minutes, potatoes, onions and carrots should be completely cooked.  Add salt and pepper to taste.  Toss in shredded cheese, let it melt and then turn off burner.  Serve as is, or topped with croutons.  This recipe will make enough soup for 4 adults.

What to do with leftover potato salad?

I love potato salad.  It reminds me of summer fun and church picnics.  I think when you eat it in Winter, it's an automatic mood lifter because it reminds you of sunnier, warmer days.  However, there's only so many times you can eat leftover potato salad before you say, "Blah, potato salad again!"  Today when I looked in our fridge and saw our leftover potato salad, that's exactly what I said to myself, so I decided to do something with it.  This recipe is really fast to put together.  I think it took me 15 minutes, and that included a 2 minute break to bandage myself up when I grated my thumb.  It was also easy to clean up my mess since everything goes into one pan- this will make Andy happy since he's our official kitchen cleaner!

Ham and Potato Casserole

Ingredients:
1 Cup Potato Salad
1 1/2 Cups Cubed Ham
2 Eggs
1 Cup Milk
3/4 Cup Water
1 Cup Chopped Carrots (about 30 baby carrots)
1 TBSP Dried Onions
1 Box AuGratin Potatoes (I used Betty Crocker)
1 Cup Shredded Cheese (I used 1/2 cup of mozzerlla and 1/2 Cup of Colby)

Preheat oven to 35o degrees.  Spray a 9" or 10" glass, pie pan.  Crush dried potato rounds from augratin potatoes into smaller pieces.  Mix first 8 ingredients together, including spice packet from augratin potatoes.  Pour in 1/2 cup of the cheese and mix.  Next put the mixture into the pie pan.  Bake for 20 minutes.  After 20 minutes, lightly stir mixture so liquid is equally dispersed.  Sprinkle the rest of the cheese on top.  Cook for another 15 to 20 minutes.  When finished, cheese will be completly melted on top, and the edges and bottom will start to turn light brown.

What to do with leftover ham?

Whenever we buy a pack of lunchmeat ham, there's always a slice or two left at the end of the pack.  It's not enough to make a sandwich with or really use in any recipe.  Celia and Charlie will gladly eat what's left by itself, but I also like to cook with it.  Here's a really easy pea recipe for you to use with your leftover bit of ham. We had it for dinner tonight.  Celia told me even the juice from the peas was delicious.  Good thing, since my meat surprised us by not being done when we started eating: the peas ended up being our main dish!

Easy Peasies
Ingredients:
1/3 Cup Chopped Ham
1 Can Sweet Peas
1 TBSP Dried Chopped Onion
1 TBSP Flour

Do not drain peas.  Add ham, peas and dried onion to a pan.  Bring to a boil.  Stir in flour to make peas a little bit creamier.  Continue cooking until juice thickens up a bit.