Magic with Leftovers

In a country, where streets are fenced with slums, and poor kids beg for food, i believe wasting of food is a crime. I come from humble background,and Mom has always ingrained the values of never wasting food, though i cant say i am very good at it, but i do try my best to manage with leftovers, as i know, there are millions dying for food.......

I also would like to appreciate an initiative by Cognizant, the firm where my husband works, where the employees have been given an awareness session about importance of selecting the right portion of food to avoid wastage, and canteen has important pointers to keep them alert about food wastage....Wish other corporates too take an initiative in creating awareness soon

I pesonally feel, each one of us can take steps to utilize leftovers in a better way:

Few of my ways to use are as follows:

1) Leftover dal: I tend to get wrong with the amount of dal required, i use it the other day, to knead my dough, with salt, and ajwain, to make dal paratha...And trust me its really good.

2) With left over alu ki sabji(This is a rare scenario, with both of us being potato lovers:P), use it as filling with some additons for pattice.
For the filling: Leftover sabji plus along some chopped capsicum, and paneer pieces, add tomato sauce, and filling is ready.

Make a dough of makkai ka atta, plus jowar flour, plus wheat flour(ratio, 2:1:1), and make rotis of it, and while raosting it on the tawa, ensure you semi cook it.
Take the semi cooked roti, put the filling in it, and make shape of the pattice by sticking the edges with help of water. Now refrigerate it for 15 mins, and then deep fry. The outer coat would be crispy, and inside the moist filling. Its scrumptious :D

3) The watery part of curd, and also spoilt milk used for making paneer, i somehow never liked it, and would waste it, this is a tip from my Mom, to knead the dough with the watery part, the roti comes softer as compared to kneading with water, and you avoid the wastage.

4) If you have too many green chillies at home, and you are sure they would be rotten, make a paste of green chillie, and add a drop of oil. Keep it in the freezer, they are fresh for roughly 15-20 days or more. The other way, is to fry the green chilly along with garlic and salt, and coarsely grind it. It is a wonderful alterantive to pickle.

5) I have tried a whole lot of tips to get soft idlis, like adding poha, or cooked rice, but never had the luck.. If you have a similar fate as mine with idlis, add a teaspooon full of baking powder to the batter, and then cook idlis........ They will be super soft. Well, i am very much against using baking powder, but this seems to be the only resort for me for softer idlis, rather than eating hard idlis unwillingly or throwing off the batter.

For now, these were my tips, lets make a conscious decision of stopping wastage of food......