Hellooooooo!
First things first — how to make leftovers awesome. (I definitely have an entire category on my blog entitled “Leftovers Made Awesome,” by the way. Check it out 😉 )
One of my favorite things is taking something that’s sitting around in the fridge looking sad and making it into a new masterpiece 🙂
On Friday at lunch, I was staring into the fridge when I noticed about a portion’s worth of my Thai Chili Garlic Chicken (just the chicken & bok choy — no more rice) from the other day staring back at me, begging to be used. I immediately got down to work turning it into a feast for me and Matt!
First tip for leftovers — add in more veggies to bulk it back up! I sautéed some spinach, tomato, green pepper, and snap peas in a pan with some oil and garlic.
Once the spinach was wilted enough…
I added in the leftover chicken and bok choy:
Then, for some healthy carbs — a package of (already cooked) 90 second brown rice. Love this stuff. It’s so easy!
To round things out and amp up the flavor again, I added in a bit of low sodium soy sauce, a tiny bit more chili garlic sauce, and a squirt of lime juice.
And voila!
A feast for two and no wasted leftovers in sight 🙂 Are you a fan of leftovers?
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And now — for a recap of last night’s food science class! So much fun, as always. This week’s adventure was fats and oils! This is more of a culinary course than a nutrition course, after all. We were all excited because one of the night’s creations was salad dressings, so to taste test them we had a huge salad bar set up!
Mmmm… I need to buy some dried cranberries to put on salads. They made them so delicious!
The other highlight of the night? These amazing paninis.
The paninis included sautéed spinach with garlic, fresh tomatoes and basil, and a feta cheese spread (!), all smushed between two crispy slices of olive bread. YUM!!!
We also experimented with brownies, trying to make them with applesauce instead of butter/oil, pureed prunes instead of butter/oil, and of course a control made with real butter. The butter won… shocker 😉 While I love health-ifying muffins… I think brownies should probably stay as they should be — a once in awhile decadent treat!
Speaking of “sometimes” food — we experimented with frying. Banana and apple fritters, anyone?
I’m off to school for a crazy busy day. I have a test at 8 a.m. (that I’m making up since I’m missing it on Thursday), 3 classes, 2 group project meetings, a 30 minute assignment to complete, then I’m racing home and changing to make it to my favorite power yoga class at 5:45, and then, finally, packing for Los Angeles! I leave bright and early (aka my flight leaves AT 7 a.m… yikes!) tomorrow morning, so I’ve scheduled a fun post to go up around 10 a.m. (tomorrow) to entertain you guys while I’m traveling 🙂 Enjoy and catch you later from the west coast… yet again!