Leftover makeover : pasta meat sauce

Meat pasta sauce is great  As a leftover. Just add some water or stock, whatever other leftovers you've got in the fridge and voila, you've got stew, or chili. Today I added frozen corn and leftover lentil rice. Yum. 

Leftover Makeover: Beef Stew

Remember the sirloin tip with very little meat fat, and wasn't slow cooked/braised so it came out rather chewy? Well it wasn't a big sell unfortunately. This meant I had a fair bit of leftovers and I needed to turn it into something yummy.

What better to hide it in than a stew! Stews hide everything. And because you're slow cooking it for a while, everything also gets quite tender. So that's where the roast went.

Sirloin tip roast leftovers
Carrots
King oyster mushrooms
Tomatoes
Onion
Garlic
Lentil stew leftovers
Paprika
Cumin
Rosemary
Red Wine

And it was good! Over rice and over pasta.

Barley & Lentil Salad

It was Meatless Monday in the house and I realized I forgot to buy some heartier vegetarian produce. So what could I make? Rummaging through my cupboard I came across some pot barley and lentils. It was a bit hot outside to be eating stew, but I could turn it into a salad! So here it is:

Pot barley
Lentils
Tomato
Egg (this is allowed for vegetarian meals right?)
Shallot
Dried figs
Dried Basil and Oregano
Cumin
S&P to taste

It was scopped onto a bed of baby romaine and dressed with the lime vinegrette I've been making a lot of. Turned out....not bad. The figs added bursts of sweetness that went with the citrusy dressing really well. The barley really soaked up the dressing so I'll need to add more to get some taste into it. But it was filling...with lots of good fibre. Until next Monday!