Sides and Leftovers for Any Time or Temp

The point of the Well Stocked Kosher Kitchen is to be able to walk into your kitchen and take what you have and put it into a creative, simple, quick and delicious dish (or dishes) that can be used to feed your family and friends on multiple occasions, whether it’s Shabbat lunch, Sunday dinner or a quick weeknight meal.

So in these recipes, I took chicken, potatoes, string beans and a variety of condiments and put them together to make a meal that can be served hot or cold. Leftovers can be used creatively to make a second meal.

I made the string beans by bringing a pot of well-salted water to a boil, putting the fresh string beans in for 2-3 minutes (until they turned bright green), draining them and then running them under cold water to stop the cooking and make sure they stay bright green. This is something that can be done before Shabbat (Thursday night or Friday morning) and then served for lunch Saturday.

To make the potato salad, I cut up red, yellow and purple potatoes into equal-sized pieces one-quarter to one-half an inch in size, placed them in a pot of cold, well-salted water, brought it to a boil and let them cook for 15-20 minutes until fork tender. I then drained the potatoes, placed them in a bowl in which I had already mixed two tablespoons of Miracle Whip, a tablespoon of Dijon mustard, lemon juice (to taste), along with salt, pepper, a little olive oil and dried tarragon. I tossed the still warm potatoes in this mixture so they soaked up the flavors of the dressing. This too, makes a great “make ahead dish” to serve cold for Shabbat lunch.

Hint: After you cook the string beans, just take them out of the pot of water and put the potatoes in the same pot. This way, you don't have to bring two pots of water to boil or, more importantly, wash two pots!

As for the leftover chicken (which was even better cold the next day), it can be shredded and put in a green salad, used to make chicken salad, added to the potato salad or you can get really fancy and put some in soft tortillas with some salsa, guacamole, beans, shredded lettuce or other greens and roll them up and eat them!

In future posts, I will talk about what you should keep in your kitchen pantry, cabinets, fridge and freezer so that when you ask yourself “Oh my gosh, what am I going to make for __________???” you will be able to answer that question quickly and simply and throw together something delicious.