With so much food being bought for Christmas it is impossible not to have quite a bit of leftovers. It is estimated that about a third of all produced food goes to waste including 15 billion meals every year just here in the UK. Imagine: this could feed the entire UK population for 11 weeks!
As planning for Christmas is particularly challenging, here goes one idea on how to make a family game out of reusing the things you have left from Christmas day.
Follow these simple steps:
- Buy some ready-made puff pastry from the supermarket, or if you are feeling motivated prepare some at home.
- Gather your left overs. Chop the turkey in bits, tear the chicken from the bone, pick up leftover sausages, gather sauces, stuffing, veggies and fruit. Anything goes!
- Put each pile of left overs in a little bowl or plate on top of your dinner table, with a spoon or fork to serve.
- Cut the pastry into parcels of about A5 size, depending on how many of you there are.
- Sit your kids around the table and let them run riot! Explore the food you have explaining to them what each bit is and what it is made of. Ask them to choose whatever they want and put it on their pie. Don’t interfere! Yes, some will be mighty yucky but this will also teach them the value of cooking a good meal.
- Once they are satisfied, ask them to fold the pie down the middle to cover the contents, and pinch the edges together. Make a little breathing hole or a slit to make sure the heat can escape when baking.
- Mark each pie with the initial of its “chef”. You can do this with leftover bits of pie crust or by carving with a knife.
- You are ready to go! Bake for the recommended amount (in the pie packaging or the recipe, as the contents will be cooked already).
- Serve for boxing-day or any other day when you don’t have much for dinner. Cut up in bits so people can “sample” each one of the pies and declare their preference. Enjoy!
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