Need a quick lunch or supper but don’t know what to fix? Open your fridge, pull out leftovers and bits in your fresh bins, then use your imagination to stir up something fresh and new.
That’s how I made this creamy Cauliflower Veggie and Greens Soup one night. We had supper on the table in less than fifteen minutes, tasty as anything we might have ordered from our favorite takeout. Here’s how to do it.
Sauteing chopped red bell pepper and baby kale in water, just enough to soften the kale a little and leave the peppers slightly crunchy
Start with what you have. In our fridge, we found
- Leftover cauliflower soup, almost enough for a meal
- One red bell pepper
- Baby kale leaves
- Cooked garbanzos (chickpeas)
With a few judicious additions, we could stretch the cauliflower soup, already rich with flavor. While Sweetheart set the table, I heated the soup with half the garbanzos, chopped and sauteed the greens and bell pepper lightly in water, added a splash of fresh lemon juice, a kiss of salt and freshly ground black pepper. Next, I added half the vegetables to the soup, pureed it in the pot with my stick blender, then stirred in the rest of the beans and veggies for a little color and light chew.
Utterly delicious! Served with homemade cheesy scones re-heated in the toaster oven–a frugal, satisfying supper, on the table in fifteen minutes. Heck, we even helped save the environment! Think of the energy it took to get those vegetables from seed to fridge. Must eat!
Quick, what’s in your refrigerator?
Take a peek right now. How might you turn your leftovers into something scrumptious and totally new? Share your idea here, or any of your favorite money-saving, quick-supper tips. If you’ve blogged about your tip, share the link too.
I have cauliflower soup in my fridge as we speak. I made my regular version and used up the remaining Alfredo sauce we had left over. That was a tasty treat. And I love my blend stick and also love to leave a bit of texture sometimes. Thanks for your version. It sounds yummy.
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My pleasure, Angel. Thanks for stopping by.
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Hi Kathryn,
I love that saute salad – looks so tasty and healthy. Thanks for sharing on Real Food Fridays. Pinned & tweeted!
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Saute salad? Fun way to characterize those ingredients, Marla. Thanks!
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Hi Kathryn, I think the best of all your ingredients is the “kiss” of salt. 🙂 Your soup is beautiful and I can tell that you made it with love.
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Thank you for checking out my recipe. Delightful comment!
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I was chuckling at GeorgieMoon’s “animal, vegetable, mineral?” question. Then, of course, you hit me with something new: Bengal grams and Egyptian peas. What? New terms for these versatile, tasty little things.
Tonight was our last night before moving on to our next house sit, so this past week has been all about using up leftovers, so to speak. Creative cooking at it’s best. Left over cashew cheeze and a bit of pasta? Macaroni and cheese! Ramen noodles, veggie stock, ginger, garlic, chili, and some fresh veg? Ramen soup! All of the oats, nuts, seeds, and dried fruit we’ve been dragging around… well, granola cooked low and slow as you suggested Yay Yay!
That’s my leftover round-up for the week.
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Impressive use of leftovers, Leah! Thanks for sharing. I laughed with Georgie at her dilemma too, grateful for her question as it prompted me to dig up those more exotic names, which I hadn’t heard of either.
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I usually put my leftovers into salads and mix with seasonal weeds to jazz them up. That’s what I did Saturday. In colder weather, I do put them into soups.
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Salads are great, Barbara, and I love that you use weeds. Do you gather them in the neighborhood?
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Yum, great soup, fridge leftovers suit soup. I think the tastes blend together better as a soup rather than rustling up some sort of griddle combination.Homemade lettuce soup is one of my all-time favourites. Chickpeas turn into hummus in my kitchen, I expect I eat it most days. Great post!
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Hummus, yes! Whenever I cook dried chickpeas, half invariably go into a hummus. The rest–we eat some fresh from the pot because they’re especially delicious then, and I refrigerate a cup or two for quick soups or stir-fry suppers. So many uses!
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I like the idea of a leftovers supper. I looked and looked in my fridge but I saw no sign of anything that answered to a cooked garbanzos. What O What is a cooked garbanzos? Animal, vegetable or mineral? Do tell!
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You may know garbanzo beans as chickpeas. Check out The World’s Healthiest Foods: Garbanzo beans (chickpeas).
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Well, I’ve learned something today! Never heard them called garbanzos beans before! I love chickpeas! It’s funny how a bean can also be a pea……
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Both peas and beans are legumes, so they’re cousins, so to speak. Quite often plant names are regional. Elsewhere, these knobby little seeds are known as Bengal grams and Egyptian peas.
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