Meals We Prepped From Leftovers + Cake Recipe!

As you already know I pretty much spent the entire monthly grocery budget in one trip.  I'm determined to make it to the end of the month so I have to make very wise use of what he have. 

Sunday morning I took the last of the pot roast I made the week before and chopped it up in small pieces.  The I put it in my slow cooker with sliced mushrooms, a can of pasta sauce, a heaping teaspoon of mincedgarlic and some dried basil.  I let it cook on low all day before adding a cup and a half of cream and cooking up some spaghetti. 

Steaming bowl of pasta bolognese

I made a spinach salad using up leftover black olives and feta cheese.  I served it with salad dressing we already had.  Our Sunday supper was very nice and you'd be hard to convince it was from a bunch of leftovers.

Monday I browned up a pound of lean ground beef and added the leftover gravy, potatoes and carrots from our pot roast dinner the week before.  I also added a can of green beans, a can of whole kernel corn, a bit of leftover frozen peas and stirred it all together.  We enjoyed that with slices of homemade wheat bread.

Tuesday I pulled from the fridge the two packages of stir fry veggies I'd bought on markdown and cooked those up with some sliced onion and mushrooms and the sauce packets that were included.  I served that with steamed rice for a quick and simple supper.  It was very good.

Spinach salad with feta

Wednesday we had leftover soup.  I added leftover spinach salad to leftover green salad to create a "new" salad.

Homemade wheat bread

Thursday I made a quick and tasty meal of quesadillas with leftover cheese and tortillas I had in the refrigerator.  I made some guacamole and served that along with leftover salsa, leftover sour cream and leftover salad.

Friday we took all the odds and ends of leftovers from the refrigerator and that was supper.

Saturday I made homemade pizza with sausage I'd cooked up a couple weeks ago and had stashed some in the freezer.  We topped it with leftover basil pesto and some Monterey Jack cheese.  I cooked up a little bit of pasta left in a box and we finished off the Bolognese sauce with our pizza.

Big pan of vegetable stir fry
Plenty left for our lunches - so tasty!

Last week I managed to use up quite a bit of stuff to create new meals so nothing went to waste.  And it was all really tasty too.  Our leftovers became leftovers so there was plenty for us to take in our lunches throughout the week.  I was quite happy with how it all turned out.

And by popular demand:

Devils Food Cake

1/2 c water                                             3/4 c sour milk

1 1/2 tsp. baking soda                          2 eggs

1/2 c baking cocoa                                1 tsp vanilla

2/3 c butter                                            1/2 tsp salt

1 3/4 c sugar                                          2 1/2 c cake flour

In a small bowl combine water, baking soda and cocoa.  Set aside.  In a large bowl cream butter and sugar until fluffy.  Add eggs one at a time and beat well.  Add vanilla and salt.  Sift flour and add to butter mixture alternately with milk.  Beat for two minutes.  Pour batter into prepared cake pan(s).  Bake at 350° for 45 minutes until done and center springs back to the touch.

I'm trying to include a weekly dessert (made from scratch) in my menu plan this year.  Our dessert this week was a pan of fudge brownies I made on Sunday.  They were very yummy and didn't last long, but I didn't really expect them too either.  My girls love brownies.  Me too.  We paced ourselves and enjoyed them for a few days anyway.