Turkey Dinner Leftover Ideas!

I know I should really have posted this about two weeks ago when everyone had leftover Christmas dinners in their fridge .. But we had two turkey dinners last week (on top of the two from the week prior!) and didn't just want to have turkey sandwiches all week (though we do LOVE them!). 

Derek and I wanted to get creative with our turkey leftovers .. So we did! Ready for some awesome ideas?

1. Strip all the meat off the turkey and boil the bones to make a turkey stock. Throw in some carrots, onions and seasoning to flavor it up!

2. Make soups! We made two batches of soup with our 2 stocks, one of them (the top photo) is a sweet potato + carrot + onion soup flavored with ginger and curry. The second photo is the prep for our turkey and veggie soup. 

3. Christmas dinner fried rice. This was amazing!! We made whole grain rice following the boxed instructions, and threw in thyme, sage and turkey stock into the water to help give it a "stuffing" taste. When that was done, we fried it over the stovetop on low heat with a drizzle of roasted garlic extra virgin olive oil (so it didn't stick to the pan!), and threw in our leftovers: turkey, broccoli, mushrooms, and stuffing (go easy on the stuffing! It's best as a "flavor pocket" kind of thing, not a main taste!). We were all fighting for the leftovers the next day for lunch!

4. Turkey taco-less taco bowls. Remember that recipe I posted for homemade taco seasoning? Well, we used that and mixed it with water and cooked it down into turkey, black beans, corn and shredded carrots. We took that mixture and topped it over whole grain rice that was also seasoned with onions and taco seasoning. We then ate it with salsa (I'm going to start making mine homemade!) and sour cream .. Yummm!!

5. Take that leftover turkey taco-less taco mix (without the rice) and stuff it into an omelette for another meal. We ate this for supper, served with homemade home "fries" .. Derek par-boiled potatoes (skin on for that extra fiber!), then tossed them with extra virgin olive oil and sautéed onions, then baked them until crispy .. So delicious. 

So those are some "outside the box" turkey leftover ideas for you!! Remember to watch your portion sizes as it's easy to overdo turkey dinners (I know I've got a pig out type of mindset when it comes to turkey dinners - it's deep-rooted from childhood!). Drink water between bites to help fill you up. Measure out everything and track it! You know I love My Fitness Pal! And make plans to exercise, even a light walk will help burn off dinner. 

I hope you enjoy! I know we did :)