How To Transform The Leftovers In Your Fridge Into A Delicious Dip

One thing I'm pretty fanatic about is not wasting food, although this is not because I'm a great chef, but because I'm terminally broke. It's also a self-imposed rule that I don't insist others abide by. Instead, I prefer to use the stealth method of making sure leftovers get eaten, which is to say, I try to repurpose them in ways that don't resemble the original dish. That way, they're actually a whole different thing, right? Well, you'd be hard put to find a better disguise than transforming leftover food into a dip, since in many cases it will be undergoing an entire makeover in terms of both consistency and flavor.

Let's start by looking at a random assortment of leftover vegetables, which at chez moi is likely to be tomatoes, peppers, onions, mushrooms, or corn (we're not big on cooked greens or crucifers). With the tomatoes and peppers, I'd blend them together with some garlic and a splash of vinegar. This makes something vaguely resembling a Balkan condiment called pindjur and is a great dip for baby carrots, pita, or the Balkan sausages known as ćevapi. For the onions and mushrooms, I'd finely chop them (by hand or with a food processor), and then stir in sour cream and lemon juice to make Russian-style mushroom caviar, perfect for dipping rye bread. Leftover corn can easily become corn salsa, which is a perfectly fine chip dip even if it doesn't involve the blender.

Okay, but what about non-vegetable leftovers? Those, too, can be dip-worthy, depending on what they are. I won't stoop to the kind of hyperbole that insists you can make a dip out of anything — in my opinion, leftover steak is better in a skillet, while last night's lasagna certainly won't be improved by pureeing. Spaghetti sauce, however, can be a dip for mozzarella sticks with no further preparation, or you can mix equal parts cream cheese, shredded mozzarella, and parmesan in a pie pan, pour the spaghetti sauce over the top, and heat it up to make a tasty pizza dip that's a lot better than the oven-baked dips you can order from Domino's.

If you have leftover rotisserie chicken, you can (and should) use it for Buffalo dip. Still have some tuna salad from lunch? Toss it in the food processor with cream cheese, liquid smoke, and smoked paprika to upgrade it into a smoked tuna dip for crackers or crostini. Cream cheese can also be blended with leftover fruit salad and sugar to make a dessert dip for vanilla wafers. While I wouldn't go so far as to say the possibilities are endless — especially since that's one of the worst cliches in food writing — dips do make a viable method of repurposing certain types of food. I'd say they're worthy of adding to the zero-waste kitchen arsenal along with leftover pot pies, stir-fries, and skillets.