Leftovers or Thinking Ahead?

When are leftovers not leftovers? When you cook with the deliberate intention of having something to use later on. Roast chicken always provides more than one meal (at the very least the carcass makes stock); indeed every Sunday roast should offer the basis of Monday's dinner. But it is not just meat that does the trick - think cabbage and mash making bubble and squeak; or just mash with a few strips of meat pointing the way to rissoles.

I rarely cook just enough rice for one dish, as there are so many ways to use a bowl of the stuff the next day. And even if I forget and it languishes unloved in the fridge the chickens will eventually be pleased to have it, though that is an extravagance.

Thursday's basis for the fried rice dish left plenty enough to make a simple stuffed yellow pepper each (how very Eighties), with a tin of anchovies, four cloves of garlic sliced thinly, lots of pepper and sprinkles of paprika and celery salt, plus a splash of olive oil and the juice of half a basics lemon. Stood upright in a metal cake tin, tops minus stalk back on, the filled peppers stopped one another from sagging and the filling stayed moist. They cooked for 40 minutes in the oven at 180C to a soft sweetness that contrasted beautifully with the anchovies, though Sternest Critic said I had overdone the latter.

In warmer times this with a salad would make a main meal, but yesterday they were served as a boost to our vegetable intake after the main course, and to brighten the meal with almost luminous yellow.

We still have enough rice left to make a ramekin each of cheesy rice - grated Parmesan, a dab of butter, spoon of boiling water, and some garlic, cling-filmed and cooked briefly in the microwave.