Meal Planning Around Leftovers To Stretch the Food Budget

Meal planning and using up leftovers are two great ways to reduce grocery expenses. Why not combine the two? Think of all the money you can save by meal planning around leftovers!

One thing you can do to save money is to use up the food in your fridge and not let it go to waste.

People waste a lot of food, especially in the United States. It’s estimated that up to 40% of the food produced is not eaten. Wasting food also wastes money. By cleaning out your fridge each week before shopping and planning your meals around what needs to be used, you can eliminate food waste and not waste the money you have already spent on the food.

To understand what I am talking about, I will share an example of the process I go through each week.

Start Your Weekly Shopping in the Fridge and Pantry

I clean my fridge before I go shopping. There are usually several things I find that need to be used.

One week I found ricotta cheese, leftover chicken and rice casserole, cabbage, two granny smith apples, one lemon, sour cream, a little bit of whipping cream, a piece of cooked chicken, a few yams, some collard greens, sliced cheddar cheese and a pound of grass fed beef.

Plan Your Meals Around What You Have on Hand

Here’s how I planned to use up everything I found in my fridge:

Ricotta cheese: I bought lasagna noodles and made lasagna. When money is tight, I make a lasagna casserole with pasta I already have in the house. I could have also made manicotti to use up my ricotta cheese.

Sour cream and whipping cream: I have a white chicken chili recipe that uses both sour cream and some whipping cream, so I put that on our weekly menu. My family loves this chili, and it is very easy to make. I also used part of the cooked chicken in the fridge for the chili.

The leftover chicken and rice casserole was used for dinner one night, but I could have also used if for lunch.

Cooked chicken, cheese and sour cream: I used the rest of the cooked chicken to make chicken enchiladas. Quesadillas would have worked, too. I used some of the sliced cheese I needed to use up in the enchiladas, too. I  also finished off the rest of the sour cream that I didn’t use in the chicken chili.

Yams: We ate the yams with dinner for a few nights.

Collard greens: To use the collard greens, I made a recipe that calls for spinach and just substituted the collard greens instead of the spinach. Spinach pies sounded like a good idea, so I bought feta cheese and used the collard greens and onions I already had and put them in a homemade dough. I also made some Arabic meat pies with the grass fed beef in the fridge and used the same dough I used for the spinach pies.

Apples: I used the granny smith apples to make a homemade apple oatmeal coffee cake that we really like. Or I could have used them to make Apple Crisp.

Lemon: The lemon was used to make some hummus, and I made some homemade pita bread to go with it for lunch one day.

Cheese: The sliced cheese was used for grilled cheese sandwiches as well as the enchiladas or quesadillas mentioned above.

Cabbage: The cabbage definitely needed to be used, so I made a stir fry.

Related: Use Reverse Meal Planning To Stretch Food Dollars Further

Freeze What You Can’t Use

This is the process I go through in planning my menus around the leftover food in the fridge. This way, I don’t waste the food I already bought. This is financially wise as well as eco-friendly.

I also look in our freezer and see if things need to be used or things I want to rotate or use up. If I see that I can’t use up something before it will spoil, I will freeze it and use it later.

Related:

• How To Prevent Freezer Burn
• Leftovers: How To Tell When Good Food Has Gone Bad

How Much Could Meal Planning Around Leftovers Save You?

If Americans really waste as much as 40% of the food they buy, imagine how much money you could save by not wasting the food you have. By following this process of cleaning out your fridge each week, figuring out what food needs to be used up and planning menus around those foods, you can feel the satisfaction of using what you have wisely.

Related:

• Super Frugal Weekly Meal Plans (+ Tips for Cutting Food Costs)
• Food-Rescuing Secrets for Avoiding Food Waste
• Keeping Track of Your Pantry Inventory
• Food Storage Practices That Reduce Food Waste
• 4 Meal Planning Mistakes That Could Be Costing You

Reviewed February 2025

About the Author

Marianne Giullian is a stay-at-home mom who enjoys finding ways to save money so they can live on one income. She likes to cook, read, and write. For more ideas, visit her website at Spendwise.org.