I’ve never been one to eat leftovers. I don’t really enjoy microwaving old food, even if it “reheats well.” But I also have a propensity to cook way too much food for a meal! (I’m hoping this trait pays off when I have 4 teenagers in the house.) These two characteristics of mine don’t exactly “gel.” Luckily, my husband has always loved eating leftovers and will feed them to the kids, too. But now that our evenings are getting busier with extra curricular activities, leftovers are becoming a regular and essential part of our dinners. Sometimes the meal can just be reheated on its own (a big pan of baked sausage rigatoni needs only to be thrown back into the oven for a bit and maybe a little extra sauce added to the mix–delish!) but other times a little creativity is needed to “transform” the leftovers into something seemingly new and exciting. I was particularly proud of last night’s transformation…

Mondays have become one of our standard leftover nights since Abby has paint class at 5:00. Sundays I like to make a big after-church dinner so I can usually get away with serving those leftovers on Monday night and my week starts out with an easy dinner. So Sunday I made a marinated pork loin, rosemary-sweet potato risotto, and balsamic broccoli. As someone who doesn’t LOVE pork to begin with, I wasn’t too enthusiastic about these leftovers. There also wasn’t enough pork to go around a full second time.

Starting with the broccoli, I dumped it into a small baking dish and added some frozen corn. I sprinkled it with a little shredded cheese, crumbled crackers, and poured some melted butter on top–voila! Baked at 375* for about 15-20 minutes and we had a small broccoli casserole. For the kids, I served this with “Cap’n Crunch Chicken Fingers” from Ree Drummond’s new cookbook (thanks again, Kristen!). I made these once before and they are an instant hit! So the kids enjoyed some chicken and broccoli for their supper.

For Randy and myself, I got a little more fancy. Risotto is a very cheesy, creamy, sticky rice. To me, leftover risotto screams RICE BALLS! So I shredded the leftover pork in my food processor and mixed it in with the risotto. Using my melon baller, I formed little round balls, about the size of small meatballs and then stuck them in the fridge to firm up. You could also “flash-freeze” them for 10 minutes or so, but I knew I had time before Randy got home from work so they’d be in the fridge for a couple hours. Then I dipped the firm balls into an egg wash, then bread crumbs mixed with parmesan cheese (you can never have enough cheese, in my humble opinion). I fried the balls in the same oil I used for the chicken fingers, which was also leftover from our sweet potato fries we had Saturday night! See, it pays to not square away your leftover oil right after use. 😉 I actually attribute my quick change in dinner plans to said oil staring me in the face Monday afternoon. Ha!

I beamed with pride as I presented Randy–who was expecting microwaved pork, rice, and broccoli–with a dinner of fried risotto balls (dipped in Thousand Island dressing) and broccoli casserole. I, myself, opted for a salad with a few rice balls on the side. I needed that burst of freshness to balance out the density of the leftovers. Still wouldn’t call myself a “leftovers” person, but I’m thinking I might have a chance at “Chopped: Leftovers!” That’s all I’m saying. 😉