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You’ve made roast chicken for dinner, or maybe rotisserie chickens are on special at the supermarket, and after you’ve had delicious meal, what do you do with the leftover roast chicken?
Wasting food has always irked me so we always try to keep in in check, but I am far from perfect when it comes to reducing food waste. So recently, in an effort to get on top of our waste, and to keep our food budget in check, I have issued my family with a ‘no waste cooking’ cooking challenge.
One food item we often have leftover is roast chicken. In the past it often sat in my fridge for a few days before I had to throw it out, so I asked my facebook followers to help me come up with this list of leftover roast chicken recipes and ideas.
- Chicken Noodle Soup – Use the chicken bones to make stock, and add any left over meat into the soup!
- Fried Rice – This fried rice is super quick and easy because it’s made with leftover rice and leftover roast chicken.
- Ricepaper Rolls – you might call these summer rolls, but whatever you call them they are a delicious way to use up leftover roast chicken.
- Savoury Triangles – you can fill these with almost anything, and they are delicious with leftover roast chicken and some cheese.
- Pizza – With homemade pizza dough, or using pita bread as the base, mix a little BBQ sauce into your pizza sauce and add roast chicken, capsicum and onion… or whatever other toppings you like!
- Cheesy Chicken Stromboli – Instead of pizza, use the dough to make this easy stromboli.
- Pizza Pasta Bake – sub the salami in this quick and easy pasta bake recipe for chicken.
- Chicken Alfredo Baked Ziti – another pasta bake recipes that is delicious with leftover roast chicken.
- Quiche – Add chicken, spinach and mushrooms to this basic crustless quiche recipe.
- Toasted Sandwiches – the best way to use leftovers! Roast chicken with cheese, or shred the chicken breast and mix it with a little bit of mayonnaise and some corn and onion.
- Leftover Chicken Quesadillas – These are like mexican toasted sandwiches… so good!
- Mustard Chicken Potato Bake – what’s better than potato bake? Potato bake with chicken!
- Chicken Pot Pies – this recipe is a great one to make with the kids.
- Baked Chicken Tacos – I love this idea for making lots of melty gooey tacos all at once.
- Chicken Yakisoba – Use leftover shredded chicken or sliced chicken breast in this easy chicken and noodle stir fry recipe.
- Baked potatoes – You can add anything you like to a baked potato, but shredded chicken mixed with a bit of sour cream and spring onions and topped with melted cheese is amazing!
- Pasta Salad – add chicken to this super simple pasta salad recipe.
- Chicken Caesar Salad – This is my favourite recipe for homemade caesar salad, and it’s awesome in a wrap.
- Cheesy Chicken Broccoli and Rice – you can use any shredded chicken in this recipe, not just chicken breast.
- One Pot Chicken Parmesan Pasta – skip the first step in this recipe and just add the chicken when you’ve cooked the onions to warm it up.
If you are not keen on having too many chicken meals in a row, or, like us, you don’t have quite enough chicken to make another meal, you can freeze leftover roast chicken.
Take it off the bone the day you cook it and chop it or shred it. Pop it into a snap lock bag and freeze. You can defrost it and use it just about all the recipes on this list.
With a couple of picky eaters in our family, and a super busy schedule, it’s not always easy to stick to our no waste cooking goals. Every now and then the wheels fall off, but we are getting better and better at making sure we use up as much as we can and waste as little food as possible. And this list of easy leftover roast chicken recipes definitely makes it easier to stick to our no food waste goal.
Read this article for more tips on reducing food waste and if you’ve got some great recipes or suggestions for leftover roast chicken recipes please share them in a comment below.
