Another Episode of Leftover Chopped!

Hello again! I am very sorry for my delay in helping with leftovers in your fridges! I had a substitute teaching gig in Kindergarten on Thursday, and apparently one of the sickly ones decided to share with me. I've been fighting a flu bug for the past couple of days and I just haven't been feeling too creative. I'm still not so hot, but it's more like a bad cold, so I'd like to try and tackle a challenge, albeit too late for the poor contributor, I'm sure! I really am sorry!

Here was my first "Chopped" request, from Jodie:

Oooo...great idea. Let's see what in my fridge... meatballs, carrots, and eggs. Of course I have all manner of rice, pasta, yada yada.

Now the only problem with this sort of thing is that I don't know if the items (i.e. carrots) are cooked or raw, or if they've been seasoned somehow. I'm going to assume for our purpose that the meatballs are cooked and unsauced, and the carrots and eggs are in their natural, raw state. If the meatballs were already covered in spaghetti sauce, then I would definitely chop them up and make either a pizza or a lasagna dish. That would be easy! :-)

If there are only 3-4 meatballs, so therefore not enough to feed the family again with meatballs as the centerpiece, I would suggest making a stuffed bread. Chopped up, the meatballs would be like seasoned hamburger, so you could add a bit of ketchup and mustard and some shredded cheddar for a nice cheeseburger stuffed bread. You could add some spaghetti sauce and shredded mozzarella for a "meatball sub" stuffed bread. The possibilities are endless with stuffed bread!

If there are enough for a full meal, you could have meatballs and sauce served over rice. Just basic brown gravy works well for this, or you can get more creative with cream gravies flavored anyway you choose. A favorite in my extended family involves a combination of grape jelly and chili sauce, so you can truly put together any flavored sauce that tickles your fancy. You might be able to create a sauce with shredded carrots in it!

For the carrots, here is our favorite way to prepare them: Cook either baby carrots or carrot slices until tender. Drain the water and stir in 1 T. sugar and 1 t. salt. This produces a slightly sweet, slightly salty coating that is very tasty.

Another possibility is to chop up the meatballs and make a quiche. My mother used to make hamburger and eggs for us all the time when we were kids (just scrambled eggs with cooked ground beef), so I don't see why you couldn't make a meatball quiche! Here is a simple recipe I've tried for quiche that works well. You could probably shred up the carrot and put it in with the chopped meatballs, but I think they would be better served as a side dish as indicated above.

I hope that gets you started Jodie! I tried to keep most of the sauces and additions open so you can use what you have on hand. If you'd like me to get more specific with recipes, just let me know! And again, I'm very sorry that this was so late. Happy cooking!!