1) Hunk o meat; 2) Cook; 3) ??; 4) Profit!!

September 3, 2013 8:52 AM

I'm a big fan of the cook-a-big-hunk-of-protein, turn-it-into-dinners-all-week thing. I need more ideas!

We like to eat the meat as a main the first night (it's our only big meat meal of the week) and then stretch it, both for budget and for variety (and to make subsequent meals quicker). Things we do often:

- grilled or roasted whole chicken --> enchiladas, salads, cottage pie, and finally stock;
- grilled flank steak --> tacos, salads, stir-fry
- pot roasted chuck --> fake barbacoa for tacos and salads, ropa vieja, beef stew
- roast leg of lamb --> shepherd's pie, gyros, quick vindaloo
- roast pork --> sandwiches, fake carnitas, fake Vietnamese bun, fried rice

I usually cook things pretty plain the first night so that they can be remade with whatever flavors we want on subsequent nights. Do you have other ideas for me for stretching a big hunk of meat over multiple meals? OR! Ideas for other things that can be cooked once and served up in multiple ways (like, make a pot of chili, have with cornbread the first night, as part of a taco salad the second, chili mac at the end of the week).

Assume we've got sandwiches, salads, and soups covered (though if you have a favorite I'd love to hear about it!). We're capable and adventurous cooks with a well-stocked kitchen and pantry. No diet restrictions. I try to stick to a budget overall for groceries but would love all kinds of ideas. Thanks!!

posted by peachfuzz to Food & Drink (17 answers total)

Response by poster: Note: I really liked this question but I'm looking mostly for ideas focused around meat. Also— obviously I am fine with quick dinners that borrow flavors from this or that cuisine, but I don't especially care about it being authentic (like, I'll slice up that roast pork and put it on bun no problem, I don't care that it's not slices of pork I dredged in caramel sauce and grilled with lemongrass). In fact that's exactly the kind of thing I'm looking for!
posted by peachfuzz at 8:55 AM on September 3, 2013 [1 favorite]

I just did slow-cooker carnitas - a big-ass pork shoulder, some garlic cloves, some spices, some tomato juice and orange juice, in the slow cooker on low for 8 hours. Go with the slow cooker in general for your meat-lump-processing needs.

As for things-to-do-with-leftover-meat -

1. Take a couple of cups of cubed/shredded/whatever'd meat and whiz it in the food processor with spices of your choice, and enough butter to make a paste out of the whole thing. Use as a sandwich spread. (This kind of "potted meat" is a very British thing, and is what "devilled ham" was trying to be in this country.)

2. When I make jambalaya, I use leftover meat in that - the recipe I have called for a couple kinds of sausage and about 3 cups of cubed ham on top of that, and I swap that cubed ham out for "whatever meat's in the fridge". Since you make it fairly bland, that'll work well with jambalaya.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 9:06 AM on September 3, 2013

We like to make full size pot pies.
posted by lobstah at 9:08 AM on September 3, 2013 [1 favorite]

We really like this char siu recipe.

If you're doing flank steak, you can grill it plain but serve it with chimichurri sauce.

Also this recipe takes chicken adobo (Filipino-style) which can be a meal one night, then refries it so it becomes more like a crispy corned beef hash consistency.
posted by brilliantine at 9:20 AM on September 3, 2013

We've been eating a lot of slow-cooked Boston "baked" beans this year, from this recipe, dialing the salt pork back 25%.

For the latest batch, I tried using a pound of cubed pork stew meat plus about 2 1/2 tsp of salt instead of the salt pork and it came out great; a lot more protein and a lot less fat. The next logical step would be to try making a batch with a pork roast; let it cook all day, then shred it and mix it up with the beans.
posted by usonian at 9:33 AM on September 3, 2013

Oh, red flannel hash is another idea. It calls for corned beef for the meat, but who says you can't use something else? (If you're uneasy about swapping out the meat, though, I am a genuine New England-type person and I personally give you permission to swap the meat for something different.)
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 9:34 AM on September 3, 2013

My local grocery store has recently had half pork loins on sale. A 4.5lb hunk of white pork meat for like $10, it's amazing.

I like to marinate it for a day in whatever I have around, or use one of those Lowry's marinades, herb and garlic is a favorite. Fire up the grill full blast until it's about 500. Drop that sucker on there fat side down for about 10 minutes, then flip it and turn it down to about 350. Cook to internal temp of 140 and rest. Takes about 45-60 minutes.

Slices of this are just outstanding. I usually do a few thick slices for a meal or two. Then thin slices for sandwiches. Then dice it up an bit and use it like chicken salad. Diced or sliced also works very well for tacos/burritos.
posted by sanka at 9:39 AM on September 3, 2013

You may also want to check out the cookbook The Pleasures of Cooking for One - I know you're cooking for more than one person, but the first section in the book is entirely made up of this kind of "cook [foo] on day 1, then use leftovers to make [baz] on day 2, and then use some extra if you have it to make [schmeh] on day 3" recipes.

And thanks to this thread, I totally just realized that I have all the ingredients sufficient to make red flannel hash tonight so thank you.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 9:43 AM on September 3, 2013

One of our favorite multiple use recipes we like to call a hippie bowl, it's usually polenta or quinoa, with roasted, steamed or sauted veggies of any ilk with your protien of choice. It works remarkably well for shopping in the seasons (in season usually= cheaper), and is a good way to use meat as a condiment to flavor everything else. Bonus points for throwing an egg on it (poached, and soft boiled are out faves, but anything goes).

Another good protien meal train we have for pork belly is first cook it Momofuku style, then:
-Chinese style pork buns
-banh mi
-cubano sandwiches
-quick-fake- ramen (miso soup base with noodles, pork slices and veg)
-eggs Benedict with thin pork slices on top.
-hash or hippie bowls

We like the pork belly because even a little goes a really long way. We can usually use a 2-3lb belly for almost every dinner meal in a week for 2 adults and a 2 year old.
posted by furnace.heart at 10:00 AM on September 3, 2013 [2 favorites]

Eatingwell had a feature on cook once-eat twice recipes that used a slow cooker. We tried the brisket and onion gravy/sloppy joes and pulled pork with caramelized onions/torta and both were really good (and I was skeptical about the torta). The recipes are listed at the top of the right-hand column opposite the first page of the article.
posted by amarynth at 10:12 AM on September 3, 2013 [2 favorites]

this site has give us many many many nights of delicious cooked forever leftovers. The Chili Plum Lamb is great but even better is Chili Plum Xxxx (mmm chili plum x)
posted by chasles at 10:36 AM on September 3, 2013

Cook a ham steak quickly on a grill or grill pan and enjoy the first night. Another night, chop any leftover ham into little centimeter-cubed sized cubes, douse with barbecue sauce, reheat and slap on a burger bun. Barbecued ham on bun. Yum.

Broil two salmon fillets with salt and pepper and a little olive oil. Eat one for dinner the first night. Break the other into smallish chunks and mix with plain spaghetti noodles, some wilted spinach or other tender greens, and some sour cream. Norwegian pasta. Yum.
posted by Liesl at 12:04 PM on September 3, 2013

You can make almost any leftover meat interesting a second night by stuffing it in a baked potato. I especially like a little hot sauce and blue cheese with leftover shredded chicken this way, but left over carnitas or flank steak would be great too.
posted by itsonreserve at 12:08 PM on September 3, 2013 [2 favorites]

If you take sanka's pork loin recommendation, I'd add that it helps to wrap the loin in aluminum foil for 7-8 minutes after you remove it from the grill. This allows the loin to "cook itself" and will ensure that you've cooked it through (even if you do like your pork around medium or so).
posted by kuanes at 12:18 PM on September 3, 2013

This is my preferred meal planning style too! (though I'm impressed by how many ways people here have found to vary things). I've made this recipe for chili verde tons of times; it's very low effort and impossible to mess up, reheats well in the pot (you can stretch it out over the course of the week if necessary by adding beer/chicken broth), and is delicious over rice or with tortillas and chips/salsa or on a plate with vegetables/sides (excellent with corn on the cob).

Recipe modifications: Canned tomatillos are fine, I think you can get by with using a cup and a quarter of olive oil rather than the two cups (olive oil is expensive!) if you stir it a little more often during the first stage, and I rec substituting beer for the water it calls for in the salsa.
posted by raisindebt at 7:28 AM on September 4, 2013 [1 favorite]

You can't go wrong with pernil. I know this recipe here is great.
posted by General Malaise at 7:45 AM on September 4, 2013

Response by poster: GREAT ideas all. Thanks!
posted by peachfuzz at 10:29 AM on September 4, 2013