The Thrifty Cookbook: 476 Ways to Eat Well With Leftovers (10 page)

Here, then, are some very general measures that you can use as a rule of thumb:

Pasta
100g per adult, around 60g for a primary-school-age child.

Rice
80g per adult, 50g per child (or about 2% tablespoons per child).

Mashed potato
About 200g per adult, 100g per child (peeled weight of raw potatoes).

Vegetables
The recommended single-portion amount for a five-a-day diet is 80g per adult, about 50g for a child. Or you can work to 3 heaped tablespoons per adult, 1-2 for children.

Dried pulses and beans
Around 80g or 3 heaped tablespoons per adult, 50g for children.

Meat or fish
You’ll need more for a stew, less for a pie, but work on the rough basis of around 140g per adult, 100g per child.

To make the most of whatever leftovers you are planning to cook with, you might need to pick up one basic ingredient as you pass the shops – something simple but transformatively ‘right’. That’s when it helps to have in your head an idea of some perfect partners.

This is such a big subject that the following ideas really just scrape the surface. But the point about just
knowing
some of this stuff is that it cuts down on the looking-up part of cooking, and it also means that you can pick up a carton of yogurt, a bag of mushrooms, a lemon or a fennel bulb on your way home, knowing that it’s the only thing you need besides what’s in your store cupboard to turn leftovers into something delicious. Tastes differ, but here are a few bedfellows generally accepted to have kicked along in a pretty ideal way. Add your own ideas to the list as you notice great combinations in restaurants or cookbooks.

Chicken
Tarragon, mushrooms, chilli, lemon (both fresh and preserved), olives, garlic, leeks, saffron

Lamb
Garlic, mint, anchovy, cumin, aubergines, yogurt, capers, chickpeas, rosemary, preserved lemon, thyme, ginger, red peppers

Beef
Chilli, mustard, horseradish, mushrooms, onions, bacon, green beans, tomatoes

Pork
Lemon, apples, thyme, juniper, soy sauce, mustard, beans, Puy lentils, fennel, leeks, lemon, bay leaves, vermouth, prunes, celery

Fish
Lemon, lime, dill, parsley, lentils, fennel, capers, saffron, leeks, tomatoes, potatoes

Sausages
Red cabbage, potatoes, cider, apples, purple broccoli, bay leaves, chickpeas, beans and chilli powder, Puy lentils, peas, leeks, roast peppers

Potatoes
Cheese, onions, mint, parsley, chives, bacon, peas

Parsnips
Celeriac, sweet potato, carrots, cheese, thyme, rosemary, chilli

Aubergines and courgettes
Mint, basil, tomatoes, chilli, garlic

Leeks
Cheese, mustard, mushrooms, sage

Peas and broad beans
Bacon, lettuce, mint, tarragon, shallots, spring onions

You don’t have to make stock. Stock powders or even water are fine for most things but, having grown up in a home where stock was always in the fridge, I can’t really imagine living without it. Apart from the cost of energy from the stove, stock is almost entirely free and it means that you’ve used up
every bit
of the goodness of the food you’ve bought. It will keep for seven to ten days in the fridge or can be frozen for months; just remember to reheat it to boiling point before use.

As well as making it as described overleaf, you can, by the way, make stock in a covered casserole dish in the oven at 150°C/Gas Mark 2, which saves energy. Alternatively, follow the instructions on your pressure cooker.

Meat stock can be made from almost any bones – though beef, chicken and ham will probably be the most useful. Use the bones or carcass left over from a roast or, if your butcher bones a piece of meat for you, bring the bones home and roast them first at 200°C/Gas Mark 6 for 40-45 minutes, until they are brown and sticky.

I’ve also shown below how to clarify meat stock. For hundreds of years, cooks have done this with egg white to produce a shining clear broth – delicious with some freshly cooked noodles, sliced spring onions or a little leftover meat.

To make the stock, put the leftover or separately roasted bones into your largest saucepan and cover with water.

Throw in 5 black peppercorns, a bay leaf or bouquet garni, a peeled carrot, half a peeled onion and a celery stalk (if you have a lot of bones, you could double these quantities).