I have to make a short post today, since I have to get to a meeting in a bit. So we’ll go with Leftovers for Lunch again and hopefully I’ll get another post in later in the week. This is yesterday’s lunch, another combination of leftover “Parent’s” cooking and something made at home.

Sorry, this isn’t as a good photo as a few of the other Korokke ones I’ve made. The potato and meat based fried croquettes are really popular at my parent’s house, and they heat and crisp up really well in the toaster for nearly a week afterwards.

The Yakisoba, which is a little like Japanese chow mein, is half homemade and half storebought. They have sell the noodles, which are the fresh variety and not dried, and the dry sauce mix at the store for very cheap - about $1.50 or less for a three pack. They completely kick the ass over any dry ramen varieties. But they aren’t very good for you, of course. If you haven’t had it before, the taste of the sauce is a bit strange - very worcestershire sauce-like. We take 2 packs and add to that some sliced pork, carrots, celery, onion and whatever green veggies are around. Not too bad for dinner and leftover lunch the next day.

Ugh, I’m a little under the weather. So we’ll have to go with simple pics with captions again for this week.

Obviously, making good use of Turkey Leftovers from Thanksgiving is definitely Cheap Eats. I say if you cooked the turkey, you’re entitled to the bones and some of the meat. Even if you didn’t make it - beg, borrow and steal that carcass. And heck with it: take the mashed potatoes, gravy, stuffing and cranberry as well. I surreptitiously begin “setting aside” a leftover goodie bag while most guests are still working on clearing their plates. And you can distract (or scare) other would-be turkey bone thieves with wild-eyed stories of the “turkey that got away”.

By the way this year, I did the turkey using the Alton Brown brine-method w/ foil turkey shield, Polder probe and once again it came out underdone. Grr… Needless to say, after following his method EXACTLY 3 years in a row with the same results - I’m looking for a new method next year.

But let’s talk, er, happy turkey thoughts. Happy turkey leftover thoughts that is: I like to make at least 2 things with the leftovers. First is an Open Face Turkey sandwich, as in below:

I just warm up the leftovers and pile it on top of toast. To me, this is even better than turkey on the Day itself. Second up: The day after I also make a stock with the turkey bones and carcass (stockpot: water, 1/2 onion, 1 garlic clove, 2 carrot, 1 celery, dried thyme, simmer slow, skim, strain, refrigerate). Then on Saturday for lunch, we add some noodles, carrots, leftover shredded turkey, dash of Worcestshire, and sometimes potatoes to the heated stock. And it’s Turkey Soup time:

Man, looks like it came out of a can. But tastes a lot better. See you next week…

I should have called this Rocket Salmon… having only in the past year or so realized that Rocket = Arugula. Anyhow, ths is another Leftover Lunch of sorts, except the salmon wasn’t cooked. This was a leftover raw piece (from a miso salmon dinner the night before) that I pan fried with salt and pepper.

The arugula is from TJs, and its spicy bite goes well with the oily salmon. I did something funky in photoshop so the salmon looks extra-red. Well, I suppose that it’s also the added red coloring that they put in salmon nowadays…

I’ve got a physical therapy appt. tomorrow, the first of a set of sessions to try and work on the shoulder/back (rhomboid muscle?) issue. I also got a new computer chair, bed, pillow and mattress. I’m hoping the P.T. helps out, as I’m itching to get back into writing more about Cheap Eats soon.

(Apologies, I spelled Korokke wrong…)

Not much progress to be found on the shoulder / back ailment lately. The only thing I’ve been able to do is limit my computer usage severely. That’s making me extremely sad, but what can you do. I’ve got an appointment to have it checked again, possibly get some kind of physical therapy lined up, but we’ll see.

Till then, I think posts are mostly going to consist of this type which is Leftovers for Lunch. I think I might have covered this particular one in the past, but I’m not sure. I really like to combine two different leftovers into one lunch where possible. This is part of a cold somen noodle lunch we’d made earlier plus a little fried korokke courtesy of the folks.

Once again, an important Cheap Eats tenet: Eat at the parent’s house whenever you can (If you like their food, of course).

“Korokke” is actually a japanese version of croquettes. My mom makes the version that doesn’t have cream or milk in it so it isn’t as rich. It’s basically mashed potatoes, ground meat (beef or turkey) and some spices. You form patties with them and use a flour, egg wash, panko mix to coat them, and then fry them up. Eaten with ketchup, hot sauce or tonkatsu sauce.

I put it with cold somen that is meant to be the kind that you dip in sauce and eat. Topped with any number of things - this time around it’s a sliced egg omelette, green onion and chopped lettuce. Yep, that cup is NOT filled with tea but with a soy sauce / mirin / bonito flake based sauce. Ordinarily, if you get this type of noodle at a restaurant it is brought out on these bamboo trays with slats that allow water to drain out the noodles. But we don’t have those, so I just put it in a bowl, slosh it in the cup of sauce, and eat it. Messy, but effective. Cold noodles like this make a great summertime lunch…

Owing to a lawn sprinkler system that needed to be fixed and several other projects I had to work on, I haven’t had much time to devote to Cheap Eats lately. So I’m going to beg off the longer post with just pictures for the time being, since I still have a ton of stuff to finish up.

This is some Broccoli and Shrimp that I had as Leftovers for Lunch - and before you ask, I didn’t buy it at Panda Express. We had some frozen shrimp that needed to be used up and there was some broccoli heads in the fridge (Chinese Market - 49 cents a pound), so I decided to try making the dish for the first time. It came out OK, though a little sweet. Might post a recipe later…

The reason for this particular post: my digital camera is about to explode. It’s filled to the brim with pictures of FOOD leaving room for nearly nothing else. So every now and then I have to dump some pics that were meant to be future posts to make room. Instead of wasting the pictures (for the average Cheap Eats post I usually need to take about 15-20 photos - because I’m not an accurate photographer) I decided to lump some of them together in a Leftovers for Lunch post.

Actually, these don’t really qualify as leftovers but they were definitely lunch. They could probably slide under the “three dollar or less” bar as well if I had the time write up a recipe for them. But I’m not going to insult the intelligence of canny crustacean cookers with a recipe for the fried shrimp pictured above - this is like the first time I tried to make them like this. I’m a bit of a fried shrimp newbie. Still, you can make some pretty decent results with a deeper cast iron skillet. It ain’t like the restaurants, but then I don’t have a deep fry cooker.

In the past, I’ve either tried the flour / eggwash / panko (”Pawn-Ko” please, not “PAN-Ko”) method, or a slurry batter using tempura batter. Lately, I’ve been having fun frying things using an interesting corn starch /yam flour mix that they sell at the Chinese Market near me. It contains these tiny nodules of yam that when fried up get extra crispy - the in-laws use it on fried pork chops. You can sort of see the yam bits as bumps on the shrimp. I’ve also tried it on fish filets with some decent results. I didn’t use any egg at all for the shrimp, just a shake-n-bake method in a ziploc bag and then into the oil.

The part that takes the longest is de-shelling, de-veining and butterflying (if desired) the shrimp. You can buy it pre-processed, but it costs more - unless you happen to live in a place where they get fresh shrimp all the time.

Next up is Yaki-soba. If you’re thinking this looks like chow mein, then you’re mostly correct. The only big difference is that it’s fried with a Worcestshire sauce type of base, and they often sprinkle stuff like furikake and a greenish seaweed called “Laver” on the top.

I usually try and make mine by boiling up some fresh ramen (they sell it just like they sell fresh pasta, although you can use instant as well), draining and rinsing it and then re-frying it quickly w/ leftover pork or beef, veggies and a Worcestshire and soy sauce base. Nice fast lunch that uses up various leftovers in the fridge.

Last up is an attempt at grilled chipotle chicken thighs. I like opening up a can of chipotle chiles (basically smoked jalapeños) and using it gradually in various dishes throughout the week. They’re pretty spicy, so you only need to add one or two for a dish. I was trying to find a recipe for grilled chipotle chicken, but couldn’t find a really good one (if you happen to know one, please send it!)

I basically marinated the chicken in chipotle, olive oil, lemon, garlic, cilantro, sugar and salt, and then cooked it in a nonstick grillpan. It came out OK-looking, but there was something missing in the taste - probably because I only marinated it for 1/2 hour. I think next time I’d also try a few other spices like cumin or chili powder and marinate it overnight.

Sorry for the “Post-n-run” but I’ve gotta get somewhere. So I’ll leave you with a few pics of what must be the number one leftover concoction in our household - Fried Rice. We almost always have some leftover rice in the fridge, and we just throw a ton of stuff like chopped ham, sausage, bacon, eggs, green vegetables, carrots, onions, etc. into the mix.

This is a bit different than the normal one I usually make - it features cubes of leftover Kielbasa and frozen green beans that I cooked and chopped. Not too bad. Lately, I’ve been trying to cook the fried rice in a large cast iron skillet - I find it browns up really nicely. The only thing is that if you crowd the pan, it’s sort of hard to turn the fried rice.