The way to avoid wasting food is to be smart about the leftovers you have after putting a meal on the table. That half a pan of overcooked rice, those leftover vegetables, but also yoghurt that is almost expired, bread or leftover pasta. With a bit of creativity, you can make lots of delicious meals from leftovers: a great resolution for the coming year, right? A basic stock of sustainable ingredients is a must, because the secret of cooking with leftovers is a cleverly stocked pantry. We will help you on your way: these ingredients are essential in your pantry.
Cooking with leftovers? Put these ingredients in your pantry
It is always handy to have a selection of shelf-stable ingredients at home. That way, you always have something on hand if you don't have time to go shopping. And by cleverly combining the ingredients in your pantry with leftovers, you can put a tasty meal on the table in no time and rarely throw food away. Give yourself the following challenge: you shop for meals for only four or five days. The other days you cook with leftovers, combined with ingredients in your pantry. Bet you'll be fine? Nice and sustainable, but also good for your wallet!
Which ingredients should not be missing from your pantry?
We secretly sort of assume that you have the basic cooking essentials at home as standard. Flavours like salt, pepper, oil and perhaps a good collection of spices are the basis of every meal, including your leftover meal. The list below consists of long-lasting basics that are either the foundation or the perfect addition.
Preserved tomatoes
Tomato puree, passata or canned whole tomatoes, all are essential in your pantry. Tomato paste is a fine base for soups, sauces and curries and fits almost any kitchen. Whether you're cooking Italian, Spanish or Asian, tomatoes almost always fit. Leftover vegetables with preserved tomatoes and a good spice mix become a tasty curry, leftover macaroni turns into a minestrone soup. And with a simple dough, a round through your vegetable drawer and a can of tomato puree, you can make this waste-me-not pizza.
Left: dried herbs and pulses in preserving jars are handy to have around the house, as they allow you to make tasty new dishes with leftovers. Right: waste-me-not pizza with leftover vegetables.
Top item in pantry: canned tomatoes
By the way, did you know that canned tomatoes are a great alternative to fresh tomatoes? Canned tomatoes ripen in the sun and are processed immediately after harvesting. As a result, they are full of flavour and nutrients and have an incredibly long shelf life. Add to this the fact that the Dutch climate is too cold most of the year to grow tomatoes outside greenhouses. So Dutch tomatoes come from greenhouses and therefore have more CO2 emissions than tomatoes coming from further afield (especially from Morocco and Spain). That's one and a half to two times more CO2 emissions! Not so bad at all, then, those canned tomatoes.
Pasta, flour and rice...
...couscous, noodles, bulgur, orzo, risotto, quinoa. All grains that are perfect to combine with fresh ingredients or leftovers from your fridge. Their long shelf life makes them indispensable ingredients in your pantry. Cook a little pasta and grill the vegetables that were still in your fridge and you have a great meal. With leftover (vegetable) milk and flour, you can make a simple flatbread, which in turn pairs perfectly with that curry of vegetable leftovers. Rice and leftover vegetables are of course always a golden combination, but even that last bit of yoghurt is often delicious with a rice dish. Risotto is also such an ultimate leftover pick-me-up. Tip: save your Parmesan rind and cook it in your risotto: extra creamy!
Legumes
Beans and lentils are also ideal as go to when you start cooking leftovers. Was that packet of tacos too big to eat in one go and are they getting tough? With a can of beans, tomato sauce and perhaps some corn and fresh ingredients you still had on hand, you can conjure up a Mexican dish in no time. Another favourite in the pantry? Wraps! You can put anything in these. That bit of salad suddenly becomes a nutritious lunch in a wrap. Your bean dish from a few days earlier in a wrap with some cheese in the oven suddenly becomes a whole new meal.
Stock
It almost feels like an open door because you can make soup from almost anything if you have a tasty broth in the house. That could be dried cubes or a jar of broth. Are you the ultimate leftover cook? Then save the trimmings from your vegetables and freeze them. That way you can make your own broth at any time. A few onions are transformed into a fragrant French onion soup, half a pumpkin that turned out to be too much becomes a bound pumpkin soup, leftover vegetables become a vegetable soup. Delicious with some toasted bread that otherwise risks getting old.
Coconut milk or curry paste
That tin of coconut milk in the pantry has saved me many times too. By combining coconut milk with just some ingredients you still had on hand - vegetables, pulses, you name it - you have a creamy curry on the table in no time. The same goes for a curry paste in your favourite flavour. Of course, you can make your own, but especially for those days when you feel like a nice meal, but not an extensive cooking session, a ready-made curry paste is deliciously easy. And honestly? Everything fits in a good curry: carrots, peppers, sweet potato, all kinds of leafy vegetables (do add them later).
Leftover peas? Exactly, with (risotto) rice in the house, they don't have to end up in the bin.
What ingredients are in your pantry?
A jar of pesto, a can of anchovies and a packet of puff pastry in the freezer have also saved me several times. Which ingredients are essential in your pantry for you? Let us know so we can add to our list. You can, of course, buy the above products in the supermarket or get pack-free at the market.
More sustainable tips from thegreenlist.nl
- Cooking with leftovers? This is what you make with it!
- Do you already know these tips? Passive cooking is the trick to saving energy while cooking.
- Waste even less food? This way, you preserve your ingredients longer.
Photo credits: Ready Made (Pexels), Nadia Pimenova (Unsplash), thegreenlist.nl, Cottonbro Studio (Pexels), Alesia Kozik (Pexels).
