Menu Planning Monday April 25th: Planning with leftovers, Easter edition

Everyone always seems to associate having tons of holiday leftovers with Thanksgiving but it seems that in our house almost every holiday comes with a large assortment of extra food. Of course we could just put it in the fridge and let everyone pick it over but that would be a total waste of resources in my opinion. I think the key to any menu planning that requires the use of already prepared food is to really plan on making enough for leftovers. We went to a friend’s house for the afternoon and ate a light meal there before coming home and having an actual Easter dinner. Emily was working all day so it was important to make dinner but I kept it easy by just making two of the dishes I brought to pass, heated up a ham, made some deviled eggs and homemade dinner rolls and of course some roasted asparagus. Everything was pretty much ready to go when we got back so it was a breeze to put together.

We ended up with tons of left over ham, What I do is make one breakfast for dinner meal with the large pieces, use some of the small chunks in a family favorite pasta dish and throw the rest in the freezer already diced. I put the bone and any odd ends in a gallon bag and freeze it until I am ready to make soup. I save the dinner rolls to be served with another meal, when you go to the trouble of making them from scratch it’s kind of a waste to not at least serve them with another dinner. If we had several rolls left over then I would use them as slider buns but in this case it’s only three.

The left over potatoes and Jello salad are in the fridge for people to have with lunch along with the rest of the hard boiled eggs, they can be made into egg salad or chopped up on a chef salad. I always make sure to separate the food that everyone can pick over from the food I plan to cook with, that way there is no confusion and we are not missing ingredients. Any time there is only a single serving then it goes in this pile, I guess the rule would be if there is enough to cook with then I do. How do you use up your Easter left overs?

This week we are eating ham and…

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Much Love, Aislinn and Emily