What to do with Leftovers!

So when I was prepping lunches for this past week, I made too much quinoa - or maybe I was secretly getting ready for a leftovers post? Yes, let's go with that. So when I was prepping lunches for this past week, I purposely made extra quinoa so that I could use it later in the week for a dinner, which led to this:

I also had a couple peppers and an onion to use up, and I was inspired by the dinner I had a few weeks ago at my BFFs house. Her fiance made his specialty, and it just so happened that the ingredients for his dinner were what I had in my kitchen, minus a few things. I picked up some sauce and sausage at Harris Teeter on my way home from work. 

If you've never tried this sauce, I highly recommend - its super good!

Okay, so I chopped up my peppers and onion and threw them in a skillet with some garlic.

While the veggies were cooking, I prepped the sausage. Then all I had to do was reheat the quinoa and throw everything on a plate! So quick, so easy, so good :)

Are those not the best looking leftovers you've ever seen?

Only problem was that I used up my extra quinoa and now had extra veggies and sausage. Which brings us to about an hour ago. I took all those leftovers (minus the sauce, because ew with eggs) and roughly chopped them - along with the mushrooms I forgot to use last night, oopsie :-/ and threw them in an omelette!

Tell me that doesn't look delicious...I dare you!

8 words that will change your life:

WEGMAN'S ORGANIC CHICKEN SAUSAGE WITH SPINACH AND GARLIC

Okay, so maybe it won't change your life, but it will certainly change your pasta. I picked this up on a whim the other day and it was ah-mazing! I was going to put it on a whole wheat pizza...I got everything - dough, cheese, sauce, toppings and I was PUMPED to make pizza. Then I got home and remembered our oven was broken...wompwomp

So I heated it up in a dry skillet the next morning and had it on a whole wheat English muffin with an egg and it was delish! I had a hankering for pasta that night (recipe below - look at me, healthy recipes to share) and decided that the leftover sausage would be great with pasta! Per usual, I was right :)

Okay, so I had no idea how to make pasta sauce. I just bought some stuff that I thought would be good in it, and did a little chopping, sauteing, heating, and simmering, and it was delish!

^These are the veggies I decided on: 1 onion, 1 organic bell pepper, 1 pound mushrooms, 10 vine-ripened tomatoes, basil (fresh from my garden, thank you very much!), 1 stem of rosemary, garlic, and parsley (which was accidentally cilantro at first because I was rushing and didn't smell it until I got home...don't worry I went back).

1. I washed all my fruits and veggies with The Honest Company's fruit & veggie spray!
2. I cored my tomatoes and chopped them into 1-inch chunks. (FULL DISCLOSURE: I attempted to peel them and then decided it was too much work and stopped after "peeling" 1/4 of my first tomato...) These went into a big pot on med-low heat to start stewing.
   
   
   
3. Chopped the onion, pepper, and 3 cloves of garlic and sauteed them in 1 tablespoon of EVOO until they were soft. Then I added my sliced mushrooms in and sauteed for another 3-5 minutes until the shrooms were softened.
   
4. I dumped that business in with the tomatoes and simmered it for about an hour and a half. Then I chopped up the basil, rosemary, and parsley and threw that in to simmer for another half hour.
   

So easy and so, so delish! I even had some leftover. I threw 2 in the freezer (don't worry, I didn't actually throw them because, duh glass) and put 1 in the fridge for later this week. YUM

I think I'll double or triple the recipe next time so that I'll have enough to get me through winter with delicious, fresh, summer tomatoes! Who knows, maybe I'll even get crazy and learn about the actual canning process!