You may have missed what a huge fan of leftovers I am but just to fill you in – there is something I just adore about yesterday’s food. I also HATE to waste food (it makes me feel sad and guilty) so even if the end result is a disaster I try to resurrect it into something worth eating…if only once.
Like my recent marshmallow incident where the recipe stated to “beat until the mixture has doubled in size”; looking back I was probably 70% of the way there when I lost interest and stopped. They weren’t as light and fluffy as they should have been but instead of throwing the marshmallow out I whipped up a vanilla cake mixture and voila marshmallow cake sandwich! The guys that built our lovely new fence thought they were delicious and even asked if I had any more the next day!
This leads me to the aforementioned recipe of spaghetti parcels using leftover fresh chilli pasta. You may be thinking I’m crazy pairing leftover pasta with bread dough and I can appreciate that. I don’t usually consume more than one type of carbohydrate per meal but this is a special case – it’s even up there with the king of double carbs: the ‘hot chip sandwich’.
I’m not going to claim that my mum invented the spaghetti pizza however she did perfect it and make it her own. Growing up, each Friday night my mum would (and still does) get together with girlfriends for wine and a catch up. Although we were probably old enough to fend for ourselves in her absence, we would get home from school to find her spaghetti pizzas prepared and ready to be heated. The bases would be store bought and the spaghetti canned but hey, we are not going to judge her (because she was a working lady living with two lazy teenagers).
These parcels are a take on a calzone or an empanada; you can successfully encase just about any leftovers in pizza dough – just add cheese and herbs and you’ve got yourself an easy weeknight dinner or tomorrow’s lunch.