Making Frozen Leftovers Tonight’s Supper – The Easy Way!

November 17, 2025November 16, 2025 RefreshHer9 Comments

What, oh what would I do without my freezer? I’ve said it before, but my freezer is my best friend…well, you know what I mean.

It’s there for me!

It has supper waiting!

It has gifts inside, both for me and many other friends!

Isn’t that a great friend?!

I’ve always put leftovers in my freezer, but I’ve not always stored them in the best way, or in a way that was easy to reheat them. But I have two new tricks using frozen leftovers that have worked for me and I want to pass them along to you!

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Christmas · leftovers · Meal planning

Dealing With Christmas Leftovers

December 28, 2020December 27, 2020 RefreshHerLeave a comment

Wow, Christmas ham or turkey goes a lot farther than that one dinner, doesn’t it? You feed eight people and there’s enough ham left over for a week of meals, but who wants to eat repeats of that dinner over and over?

No one.

What to do? Here are a few suggestions for dealing with that leftover food in your fridge:

Ham –
Place slices in small freezer bags and freeze to use for another supper meal in a couple weeks.
Make scalloped potatoes and ham.
Chop up ham and use in omelets
Mix cubed ham with shredded cheese. Place inside a rolled out canned biscuit. Fold over like a turnover and seal. Bake. Serve with honey for a delicious breakfast.
Turkey –
Make a cream gravy and add turkey. Serve over warm biscuits for supper
Turkey salad – Use this recipe for Chicken salad, substituting turkey. Here’s a version of Hot Chicken Salad that you could also use substitute with turkey.
Make a Turkey pot pie.

If you have leftover Green Bean Casserole or your creamed corn, you can freeze it! Place the vegetable in small Freezer bags, press flat and freeze as a flat package. It is easier to store in the freezer and also thaws quicker.

Leftover rolls – Use for a baked egg casserole, breakfast sandwich, filled with ham and an egg. They can also be frozen for a week or so.

Leftover cookies, cake or pie – Most all of these can be frozen beautifully, if packaged well. I place mine in tins, covering the inside with syran wrap. You could put ice cream between two sugar cookies and make it a specialty ice cream sandwich! Crumble cake layers for a Trifle. You could even mix pie pieces into plain ice cream for an awesome holiday flavor!

Refreshment treat — Use your leftover sprinkles as toppings for the sides of the Ice cream sandwich!

Cranberry – Make a salad dressing with it. This is Cranberry Vinaigrette is my favorite!

Make your own Frozen Dinner! Place the individual servings of the meat, potatoes, and veggies in a small disposable tin. Cover well with foil. Freeze. Pop into the oven for the best kind of “frozen dinner” ever!

You spent lots of time and money on that meal; utilize it; don’t toss it!

How do you make wise use of Christmas leftovers?

Refresh those leftovers by “reinventing them into something delicious!

Cooking · Dinner · main dish · Main entree

Perfect Pork Tostadas

June 26, 2017June 23, 2017 RefreshHerLeave a comment

I love to take the leftovers from a great entree and turn them into something completely different – you know hide the fact that we’re eating leftovers!

I found a great way to use pork tenderloin this week that was so delicious and so different from the way it was originally served, that there’s almost no way someone would have know that Sunday dinner was being revisited (isn’t that better than saying, “leftovers?!”).

Enter the Pork Tostada! I ask you – does this look like boring leftovers?

Grilled Pork Tostadas

1/4 cup olive oil
1 tsp salt
2 tsp ground cumin
2 Cups Chopped Pork Tenderloin, cooked
1 cup peppers, multi-colored, chopped
1/2 Cup Red onion, chopped
Tortillas
1 1/2 Cup Mexican cheese
Toppings – lettuce, sour cream, tomatoes, cilantro, lime wedges, avocado

Combine oil, cumin and salt. Pour half of mixture over vegetables to coat. Pour the other half over the meat, stir to coat.
Cook vegetables in small amount of oil until tender. Add meat, cook until meat is warmed.
Brush tortillas with olive oil and place on baking sheet. Toast tortillas in 400 degree oven until crisp. Top with vegetables, meat, cheese and return to oven and allow cheese to melt.

Serve immediately. Serve with added toppings.

I served this with Spanish rice and fresh fruit and it was sooo good!!

Roast a tenderloin and grab the remains so you can make these!

dinner in 30 minutes · main dish

Dressing Up Leftovers

June 13, 2016June 10, 2016 RefreshHerLeave a comment

When you have meat leftover at the end of a meal, if you’re like me, there’s a temptation to reheat it the next night and serve it in the same way you did the first time – same salad, same side dish. Maybe there’s just a difficulty in getting creative with that meat!

Last week I had both pork tenderloin and grilled sirloin steak leftover. I took those meats and made two completely different entree’s with them. With a disguise like that, I wonder if my husband even knew he was eating leftovers…okay, he did, but they were so good, I know he didn’t mind! Here’s what I made:

With my Brown sugar and Balsamic Glazed Pork tenderloin, I made Toasted Pork Sandwiches. I added the pork and the glaze to a pan and heated it. Then I toasted the bun – this makes it sooo good! Spray the bread with cooking spray, then toast in a skillet until lightly browned. It gives the bread great crunchy texture.

Then I piled meat, red onion and avocado slices on the bun.

It was so good!

The next leftover was the sirloin. With it I made a Blue Sirloin Salad.

First I made up Pioneer Woman’s Blue Cheese Dressing. Here’s my lightened up version:

Blue Cheese Dressing

Ingredients
1/2 cup light mayonnaise
1/4 cup 2% milk
1/4 cup lilght sour cream
Dash of Worcestershire sauce
1/3 cup blue cheese crumbles
Salt and pepper

Directions
To a bowl add the mayo, milk, sour cream and Worcestershire, and stir until combined. Stir in the blue cheese and add salt and pepper to taste.

On a plate I piled up Spring Mix greens, red onion, yellow peppers and tomatoes. After warming the leftover sirloin, I sliced it and place it on top of the salad, then I topped the salad with the Blue Cheese Dressing.

Voila! Dinner was served!

How good does that look? It was refreshing and on the table in about 10 minutes!

How’s that for a makeover? I wish I could get a personal one that quickly!

How do you makeover your meat leftovers?

With love from my country kitchen,

Lunch

Make Soup with Leftover Mashed Potatoes!

February 22, 2016February 20, 2016 RefreshHer4 Comments

potato Soup.jpg

They say that “Necessity is the mother of invention,” and such was the case with the Potato Soup I made last week! I had a LOT of leftover mashed potatoes that I wanted to use up, and the first thing that came to my mind was soup! I have a couple of Potato soup recipes that we love, but when you have red-skinned potatoes that are perfectly cooked, mashed and ready for use, it’s a sure-fire ingredient for a delicious soup and also a 30-Minute meal! Here’s how I made it:

3 Cups Leftover mashed potatoes (I used red-skinned potatoes with the skins on)
1/2 C Onion, diced
2 Tbl Butter
2 Cups Chicken broth
1/4 Cup milk
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp pepper
1/2 Cup Grated cheddar Cheese
1/2 Cup light Sour cream
Crumbled Bacon bits
Chopped Green onions

In saucepan, melt butter. Saute’ onions until soft. Add chicken stock and milk. Blend in mashed potatoes and stir until smooth. If it seems too thick, add more broth. If it’s too thin, add more potatoes. Add seasonings. Add cheese and stir until melted. Remove from heat, add sour cream and stir until blended. Heat on stove just until warmed.

Spoon into bowls and top with bacon bits and green onions.

potato Soup

I don’t know about you, but I often get stumped about what to fix for lunch. This was a great entree for noon, and really took only a little more time than stirring water into a can of soup! I’m certain it was far better!

The next time you have extra mashed potatoes, don’t toss them – try this recipe instead! It’s so creamy and delicious you’ll want to make again again!

With love from my country kitchen,