Turkey, Turkey and more turkey

For Christmas I ordered a 15lb turkey back in October. It is ordered through my aunt who's friend has a small holding. I ordered a large turkey as my sister, niece and husband were coming to stay over Christmas. However circumstances changed (when don't they?!) and it ended up being me, my brother and my two children. So I have had a large amount of turkey to use up, even more so as the children go to their Dads on boxing day for 2 nights and my brother had to go home for work on boxing day.

One of my new year aspirations is to cook more from scratch at home, I also want to waste less. So turkey seemed like a good place to put my good intentions into practise. With the left over turkey I have eaten dinner for the past few days, I have a little for our picnic lunch on our long drive tomorrow and I have made these;

Turkey chilli based on This Jamie recipe I adapted it slightly to suite the ingredients I had left in the fridge and what was in the store cupboard

5 turkey pies, also using the leftover gravy I had in the fridge leftover from the big day.

Sausage rolls, using unused sausage meat and leftover pastry from the pies.

I also made curry, the three pots on the left hand side, again using leftovers and bits from the store cupboard

Once I was finished stripping the turkey off the carcass I made some stock.

All of the yummy turkey goodies are stashed in the freezer, providing me with some lovely ready meals when I start back at work on Tuesday. I am hoping that I will get into the habit of cooking this way each month it's a frugal way of living I am aiming towards.

I also had a little wander around the sales, well it would have been not to. I got some little knick knacks to put away for stocking fillers and birthday presents. Not too much this year though I was very restrained. I couldn't resist these though;

The four little pots hanging by the window. They were the grand total of 74p each!

So cute and just the green I want to decorate my kitchen in. I am planning on growing my own herbs this year and though these would be ideal for some to be grown indoors. I am planning on organising this when we get back from my sisters house after new year. Currently they are holding the rosemary and bay leaves I collected from the allotment and am drying out.

Later on I will add the recipes I used for the turkey leftovers onto my recipe page.