I’ve not tried to make the following recipe but the ideas were too good to keep to myself.  I don’t keep a lot of dessert materials on hand so it’s unlikely I’d get around to making this for several months.  I hope someone can try this and report back.  Since I’ve not made it yet, I don’t have any exact measurements or even specific ingredients to recommend.  Maybe someone can make it and post back their recipe…

American Hedgehogs

• Chocolate chips (any kind leftover from something)
• Sweetened condensed milk (or evaporated milk and sugar)
• Nuts (any kind, chopped)
• Cookies (any kind, fresh or stale, crushed into chunks)
• Candies (any kind, chopped into small bits)
• Dried fruit (any kind, chopped)
• Anything else that might taste good in this like marshmallows, pretzels, candied orange peel, etc…

Mix equal parts chocolate and sweetened condensed milk to make a simple fudge.  You could also add some vanilla extract, butter and/or marshmallows.  If you’re really unsure, just follow a fudge recipe.  Then add in any or all of the remaining ingredients to make a lumpy sticky mess.  Pour into a baking pan lined with parchment or foil and refrigerate until firm.  Cut into bars.

If anyone gives this a go or has a good hedgehog recipe, feel free to post a comment.  Wow, just typing up this post is making me want to run to the store…

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I just received the Nov 2008 issue of Chile Pepper magazine (yes, I actually do get a magazine called Chile Pepper) and found an article called “Embracing What’s Left” that has recipes for using left overs to make some spicy dishes.  I’ve been getting Chile Pepper magazine for many years and this is the first such article I can remember.

The recipes included are pretty straight forward but have some good ideas for different ways to use up left overs.  Here is a summary of the recipes:

• Hot and Sweet Asian Leftover Salad – A hot, sweet, sour and salty dressing over leftover turkey, chicken or ham with shredded cabbage, glass noodles and vegetables.
• Leftover Stuffing Hash – This is more like a stuffing frittata with onions, bell peppers, leftover turkey and stuffing sauteed and then mixed with eggs and cream and finished under the broiler.
• Wild Rice and Leftover Salad – Wild rice and left over turkey with dried cherries, pecans, chiles and vegetables drizzled with a dressing of cranberry sauce, dijon mustard, champagne vinegar and olive oil.
• Leftover Pot Pie – Just like it sounds using a prepared pie crust.  Personally, I’d make the crust myself.
• Leftover Mish Mosh – Pureed cooked brussels sprouts and root vegetables with an egg as binder started in a skillet and then transferred to the oven.

The specifics of the recipes aren’t that important.  Take the ideas and make your own variations on these using ingredients you already have that you know your family likes.

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Canned beans are great because they’re still very inexpensive and can go from unopened can to table in 5 minutes or less.  In my pantry I usually keep plain black and white beans, refried pinto and or black beans and some flavored varieties, like Cuban-style black beans.  One of my favorite things to do with canned beans is to use them as a base for a leftover stew.  Below is a particularly tasty mix I created for a weekend dinner when I didn’t feel like cooking.  This made just one serving.

Brazillian-style black bean and left over stew

• 1/4 lb of left over low fat turkey polish sausage, cut in moon-shaped slices
• 3 large cooked shrimp, cut in half
• 1/4 medium onion
• 1t olive oil
• 1 roma tomato, chopped and drained
• 1/2 can Trader Joes Cuban-style black beans (black beans with onion and peppers)
• 2 cloves of garlic, chopped finely
• 2T parsley, chopped

Fry sausage and onion in olive oil until it is browned.  Add tomato and cook for another 5 min.  Add the black beans and heat through until simmering.  Add the shrimp and parsley to your bowl.  Add the garlic to the beans and cook another 2 minutes.  Add the bean stew to your bowl and mix well.

This recipe is based *VERY* loosely on the Brazillian feijoada stew that has all sorts of meat, sausage and black beans.  If you like the combination of meat and beans, you should definitely look up a recipe for feijoada and give it a try.  I’m sure I’ll post a recipe here soon since it’s one of my favorites.

This formula could work for lots of different left over meats and vegetables.  Take your left overs and add enough beans to make a nice stew and heat it through.  It could be as simple as that.  I like to caramelize some of the meat and vegetables first for added flavor.  I also like to add fresh garlic, onion and herbs to enhance the flavor.  Be creative!

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Traditional Greek moussaka is a layered casserole of ground meat, eggplant, tomato, white sauce, and spices. The recipe that follows is far from traditional moussaka, which itself has many variations in Greece, Eastern Europe, Turkey, Egypt and other Mediterranean countries. This recipe for moussaka from leftover spaghetti sauce came from my attempt to do something healthy and interesting with leftover spaghetti sauce and some fresh vegetables from the farmers market.

The recipe

Spaghetti sauce moussaka

• 3 cups leftover spaghetti sauce with meat
• 1 large eggplant, sliced into 1/8″ rounds
• 1 medium zucchini, sliced into 1/8″ rounds
• 8 white mushrooms, sliced thinly
• 1 roma tomato, sliced very thinly
• 3T olive oil, divided
• 3 cloves garlic, chopped
• 1/4 cup fresh flat-leaf parsley, chopped
• Salt and pepper

Put 1T of olive oil into the bottom of a baking dish and smear to cover the bottom.  Layer half of the eggplant and sprinkle with salt and pepper.  Next, layer half the zucchini and then all the mushrooms.  Finally, layer all of the tomato.  Cover with all of the spaghetti sauce.  Layer the rest of the eggplant and zucchini, adding more salt and pepper.  Mix the garlic, parsley and 2T of olive oil.  Spread on top of the casserole.  Bake uncovered at 350F for about 45 minutes or until the vegetables are soft.  If it starts getting too brown on top, cover with foil until done.

Ideas for moussaka variations

When I came up with this moussaka with leftover spaghetti sauce recipe I was going for something that was primarily vegetables.  Obvious additions to this would be a velvety bechamel (white) sauce and bread crumb or cheese topping.  You could also add some sliced potatoes or other vegetables.  Almost anything would be good in there as long as it can be sliced thinly or lays down flat.  You could do a Mexican variation by using leftover taco meat instead of spaghetti sauce and then add jalapenos, beans, and/or pepper jack cheese.  You could finish that off with sour cream or salsa.  YUM!  I think I may try that next time!

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