Struggling with Left Overs

There are some things I like to cook in batches with the idea to freeze, like spaghetti sauce ( for squash or zoodles) stock, chilli etc.

Otherwise, I try to plan dinner, with a next days lunch in mind.

it does take time to really figure out how much food to prepare, but that comes eventually.

As others have said, I am also trying to look at food as fuel, and not a hobby. But I do enjoy cooking, so now I try to focus on how can I make recipe x fit my plan, or trying new ideas I find on here or elsewhere online.

one thing my sisters and I are trying is a soup swap. each of us is making a soup/stew/ chilli type dish. And we'll make enough for the three households. I get to try a new recipe, and in exchange, get a few lunches or quick dinners taken care of too.

i throw out very little food. Most leftovers can be mcguyvered into something else Too to change it up.

We never have leftovers. I have teenagers.

I have thrown away a lot of stuff if it tempts me, though. My boys hate that!

I had to learn to toss food. Some - I either freeze (label is a must) or "semi-can them".

Hot items like meat sauce, chili, soups - I put in glass jars while the food it very hot, close the jar and place it upside down. Ideally lose jars close to size of the serving of the dish.

The heat seals the food inside the jar and it can keep a couple of weeks or months inside fridge without freezing.

FYI- I also use leftovers for new dishes ,- i.e. meat sauce can be used to make stuffed peppers or stuffed squash. Adding little bit of tomato sauce, leftover rice from chinese food mixed in for my partner, and maybe adding some chopped veggies to mine. Etc.

Good issue. One thing I do when making chili is to plan it will be two days of dinners. Any more than that and no one wants it. I don't have much luck with freezing leftovers. It goes into the freezer and stays until its unidentifiable and then gets tossed. Why bother with that step?

I also have made chili without the beans and then heated a can of beans separately. Then those who want beans can add them. Early on when I cooked for my non sleeved husband I just made a protein-veggie dinner for myself and added a baked potato for him.

Finally, just get over the idea that its a crime to waste food. "Better in the trash than on your ass". Tossing 50 cents worth of food is not going to help the hungry. If you really feel bad, put that 50 cents in a jar and save it and donate it to the hungry. Cleaning your plate is not a requirement for sainthood. DS

Food saver and lots of freezable containers.

Hubby and I started a new project to eat only homecooked meals (except for planned special dinners out) with the first of the year. We found out REALLY quickly that this leaves a LOT of food left over. Luckily hubby was already good about taking leftovers for lunch at work; I need to develop this habit.

We also learned to only leave 2 or 3 servings out in the fridge, and freeze the rest, otherwise it goes bad before we use up the leftovers.

I made a Mississippi roast yesterday, and after our dinner, I put 3 containers of meat in my serving size, plus a larger container with enough to make another dinner in the fridge. Then put another dinner's worth in a freezer bag with plenty of "juice" and froze that. At this point, between the fridge and freezer, we could go a couple of weeks without cooking and still be eating homecooked meals.

Right now we're using disposable containers I found on Amazon because we're both really bad about getting them clean after use. I'm hoping we can both add the rinse it out habit later and switch to higher quality containers.

We have had to adjust too. My husband is almost a year out from VSG and I am 3 months and we have really had to change our mind-set. We have started to buy and cook less portions. We have 3 other people in the house, but despite best intentions, sometimes leftovers have to get tossed. We have a 9 year old and an 18 year old and some weeks they will eat the leftovers and some weeks they wont. We have also been giving extra leftovers to our 22 year old who lives on her own. If at the end of the week we have an abundance of leftovers in the fridge we will do a night or two of left overs. I also take my lunch 99% of the time so that helps.

Do you have a neighbor or a fiend who might like a meal or two?

So... we are a family of 2 most of the time that expends to 5 when the teens visit. So I've had to learn how to have "scalable" recipes.

I don't throw away food if I can help it, but I don't have any issue with tossing it in the freezer if its clear I'm not going to fini**** in the next day or two.

I'm pretty good about taking leftovers and creating something different "enough" to seem like it's a new dish. So if I have a rotisserie chicken the first night, I know the meat will be used in a chicken salad, chicken chili, tortilla soup, base for chicken pot pies for the kiddos, etc - and some of those are prepped and put straight into the freezer so it won't be referred to as "the hellacious two week period when we ate nothing but chicken". Fritattas and omelettes are great for leftover veggies/meats.

But in general, if its a recipe that makes a large batch, I freeze leftovers. It saves me time and money since nothing goes to waste. What's changed is the size container I now use to freeze them (I pick a container that's 1/4 of the size I used to use and it will still end up feeding me several times over a week). I also freeze items in small 2 ounce containers if I know I only want to eat it once.

The trick for me is how I make sure I remember to use it.

Before I menu plan for the week, I "shop" my freezer first. I pull out any soups, refried beans, chilis, turkey meatballs, or other frozen meals I've prepped beforehand. Then I make note of anything else in the freezer I already have on hand (fish, shrimp, turkey slider, veggie tots, etc) that I want to pull out the night before I cook it. I make note of anything in the fridge I need to use SOON before it expires.

I plan meals around what I have on hand first, check the pantry to see what ingredients are missing, and then make my grocery list for fresh veggies and to fill in the gaps around those items. Leftovers from the freezer also come in handy if I'm sick and not in the mood to cook, but I want home cooking.

Other option when I cook - I trade frozen meals with someone else who does the bulk cooking. If I've got a couple of extra chilis/butternut squash soups, etc... I'm happy to trade if they are doing different recipes. I just have to know them well enough to know they cook in a way where the food is healthy for me to eat. If a family friend is sick/pregnant, etc, I usually bring over a couple of soups, meals, etc to put in their freezer with the instructions attached with the sharpie/painters tape.

Also, I'm embarrassed to say I keep a freezer inventory on a spreadsheet but that's my own insane quirkiness coming into play.

We struggle with this one too. We just eat on it a few days. For some reason once I freeze cooked food it becomes unappealing.I won't reheat it, and it ends up in the trash a month or so later. One thing I have found useful is to break up my meats as soon as I get them home from the grocery, which prevents me from cooking so much at a time. A goal of mine is to wash and season my raw stuff, and freeze it so that I can let it thaw, it lies there defrosting in its own marinade, and I don't have to do so much prepping when I get home from work.

I would cook with the plan to freeze the leftovers in measured serving sizes so that you do not have to thaw out the whole frozen left over.

We take it for lunch the next day. We freeze in individual portions for a frozen dinner for the little ones, when I work. Sometimes we portion up a big bowl and take it to the elderly neighbors that I have. They enjoy a home-cooked meal -they have a hard time cooking due to their physical limitations.