Using leftovers is like playing Ready Steady Cook in your own kitchen.  Your fridge and cupboard contain only a few items in addition to your consistent staple ingredients.  So what are you to cook?  I rather like when a grocery shop is well overdue; the challenge of making a meal with few ingredients.  My key ingredients this time were leftover lunch ham and baby aubergines that I had bought simply because they were pre-packaged for $0.99.  I always have olives and leftover oil from the sundried tomato jar in my fridge and fortunately there was also some leftover parmesan and rocket.  The ingredients combined created a flavoursome pasta dish.

This recipe also contains a little trick of how to make your own roasted marinated vegetables at home.  Firstly slice your vegetable of choice lengthways or into wedges (for tomatoes).  For zucchini (courgette) and eggplant (aubergine), frying on a griddle pan does the trick.  Tomatoes work best under the grill and red capsicums (red pepper) work best in the oven so the skin can blister to be later removed.  Of course, play around as it all depends how much time you have.  The trick is to immediately place the vegetables in a Tupperware container once removed from the heat, season, drizzle with a splash of olive oil and then cover with a firmly fitting lid.  The trapped moisture continues to soften the vegetables and enhance the flavours.

Aubergine tossed spaghetti with leftover ham and rocket

Serves 2

Ingredients

2 teaspoons olive oil

4 baby aubergines (about 200 grams), sliced lengthways (about ½ cm)

60 grams ham, thinly sliced

2 teaspoons oil from the sundried tomato jar (or olive oil) + 4 tablespoons of water

100 grams thin spaghetti

6 black olives, thinly sliced

good handful of rocket

grated parmesan cheese

salt and pepper

Steps

• Place a griddle pan over medium high heat and add 2 teaspoons olive oil
• Place aubergine slices in pan and cook for 3-4 minutes on each side (until golden brown)
• Remove from heat and immediately place in Tupperware container with the lid on firmly
• Leave for approximately 20 minutes to further soften the eggplant  (This is a great way of quickly creating your own marinated vegetables.  Store them in the fridge and add to dishes or sandwiches)
• Meanwhile place water on to boil and cook spaghetti as per instructions
• Return the griddle pan (to save washing up) over medium high heat and fry ham (you may need a teaspoon of oil)
• Place aubergine, additional 2 teaspoons of oil (preferably sundried tomato oil for the flavour) and 4 tablespoons of water into a mini food processor and quickly blitz (doesn’t have to be smooth)
• Drain pasta and return to saucepan, mixing through aubergine, ham, sliced olives and rocket (you may require an additional splash of water or so)
• Season with salt and pepper
• Serve with grated parmesan

Per Serve (including cheese, about 25 grams between 2)

1646 kJ, protein 18 g, total fat 18 g, sat fat 5 g, carbs 37 g (sugars 2.1 g)