Bean making the most of leftovers

Today’s soup isn’t really a recipe but I thought it was worth sharing to show what can be achieved with leftovers. Actually, it’s a tale of things going wrong whilst using up leftovers and my subsequent determination to avoid food waste.

I was making a batch of chili in an attempt to use up a pile of leftover vegetables that were still fresh but definitely wouldn’t be for much longer. In my enthusiasm to use everything up, I went way, way over the top and couldn’t fit everything in the pot (and that was just at the beginning). I decided to split what I had made so far and added a tub or two of a basic chili base to the freezer. I even remembered to label it.

Now that we are in the post- festive period and craving some vaguely healthy food I decided it was time to dig it out and see what could be done. The base was really think so I added some vegetable stock to thin it down. Other than that, I just tarted it up a bit by adding:

• A few drops of Tabasco (cos I love it)
• Creme fraiche (leftover from New Years dinner)
• Jalepenos (I always have a jar in the fridge)
• Some sweetcorn (found lurking in the cupboard)
• A few slices of a red pepper (leftover from another recipe)

I already had some wraps in so made myself some tortilla chips. They always look way more impressive than they should as they are so easy to make. They’re tasty too as you can flavour them any way you want.

To make the tortilla chips:

• Pre-heat your oven to 170 fan
• Take one wrap
• Spray with oil
• Season (I just use sea salt)
• Cut the wrap into wedges
• Put the wedges on a baking tray, don’t overlap them or they won’t crisp up
• Heat in the over for around 5 – 8 minutes

It’s a really fine line between being cooked and burnt so keep an eye on your tortilla chips and remove as soon as they start to brown around the egdes and turn golden.

So food saved and a culinary disaster averted. Tasty too!

I’d love to hear how use your leftovers. All ideas welcome.

Cheers

Val x