Last week with Hurricane Sandy quickly approaching, I decided I would bake and cook in preparation. If for some reason we lost power I wanted food in the house. Obviously I couldn’t make anything that would have to be heated up so I made some pasta to toss with cheese, pepperoni, and balsamic dressing. I also pre-cooked brown rice. At the worst we could have a cold rice salad, tossed with fresh vegetables. We didn’t have a power outage. That is so okay with me. It just means my prep has made my week so much easier.

Over the weekend I had made Broccoli Smoked Cheddar Soup. Use your favorite recipe. There is nothing so special about my recipe or lack there of that will make this not work for you.  Monday we decided to make a hot lunch in case we lost power that afternoon. We baked chicken breast, used some of the pre-cooked rice, and smothered it in mushroom soup. There you have it, two meals.

Last night was a “ugh, what am I making for dinner? I don’t want to cook” kind of night. I went to the fridge to see what was there.

1 chicken breast with approximately 1/2 cup mushroom soup

4-5 cups rice

2 (ish) cups broccoli soup

Mixed them together and heated them through in a 375 degree oven.

My leftovers are gone but instead of having to make 3 meals from scratch I was able to utilize leftovers to make a stressful day end a bit easier.  This 3 day combo is DEFINITELY going on my meal plan and I am off to see what other meals I can do this with.  This way I can Make meals Monday and Tuesday and have an easy “throw together” on Wednesdays when I work outside the home.

What leftovers would you combine to create a new dish? Feel free to share.