Ways to stretch takeout

[Anonymous]

I know the purpose of takeout is to not have to cook. But sometimes I just don’t even want to heat up a Trader Joe’s meal. We only do this 2-3 times a month.

Of course it’s getting expensive. Any tips or “hacks” (apologies If you hate that word) to stretch it out for more people or more meals?

[Anonymous]

Bulk it with frozen veggies. Very easy to do with Indian food, some Chinese food, Thai food, etc.

Makes it a bit healthier, too.

[Anonymous]

Where do you get your takeout?

When we order from Ruthies, I always get a large side of pulled pork pinto beans and eat those with an avocado, and that's my entire meal. It's enough for two meals, really, so I use the rest for lunch the next day. It's six dollars.

So maybe my tip is be creative about what constitutes an entree?

[Anonymous]

We get thai curry or any asian stir fry entree and make extra jasmine rice at home, either on the stove or frozen microwave packs. The restaurants are often sooo stingy with rice, and for what? There's just two of us and we can get always at least two meals out of one and usually one or more servings of leftovers the next day.

[Anonymous]

I find a lot of times that there is way more sauce in takeout dishes than we really need. So if we get curry, for example, we'll eat the meat and veggies and still have a container full of curry sauce. I freeze that sauce to use later on my own chicken & veggies (or lamb/beef/whatever).

[Anonymous]

I'll throw a sheet pan of veggies in the oven when I order so it is ready by the time the takeout comes (whether delivery or DH or I grab it).

We order extra sauces so can reuse those on baked chicken or something.

If something comes with sides, we ask for them in separate containers so they aren't mixing with other stuff and I've found they give more. We repurpose those containers for lunches etc.

[Anonymous]

Get no toppings on pizza and add your own pepperoni at home. Saves a few bucks per pie.

Don’t spend money on salad or things you could make at home.

[Anonymous]

I always make salad with pizza. If I'm not super hungry or trying to order 1 instead or 2 pizzas (we're a family of 3 with a teen so it's on the edge of if we need 1 or 2 pizzas) I will roast some veggies to go with the salad. I like lots of veggies anyway.

We get a good sized order of Thai food and Indian food when we order, and the leftovers are usually a little less than 1 additional meal. I make rice, cut up some veggies (cucumbers and cilantro and lime work for both), and for Thai I'll make frozen spring rolls or frozen TJs scallion pancakes. For Indian I'll heat up frozen garlic naan and/or TJs veggie samosas.

Occasionally I've ordered minimal takeout like just a main meat or asian dish and made rice/sides at home.

We don't really order other types of takeout except sushi, which we eat all of.

[Anonymous]

Stretch entrees by placing them over riced cauliflower. I heat that quickly in the microwave. Or if I get chicken with broccoli, microwave extra broccoli florets. Sometimes I make fried rice using leftover rice from takeout Chinese food.

[Anonymous]

Agree with bulk it with veggies. I roast cauliflower or broccoli to get sides or if I get indian just add it to that. Can be really
Easy to stretch curries and saucy Indian recipes with veggies

[Anonymous]

If I get Chinese takeout (or Thai, Vietnamese, etc) I steam broccoli at home and add that for extra veggies. It also stretches the dish to an extra meal or two. I also will often use leftover sauce (like from Indian) or soup to put over rice, maybe add some steamed veggie, for another meal from the leftovers.

[Anonymous]

These are exactly the types of suggestions I was hoping for! Thank you!

-op

[Anonymous]

Didn’t discover this trying to stretch but I will mix jasmine or sticky rice into the mu shu chicken filling and add some soy sauce. My daughter eats all the mu shu pancakes so I added rice once and it was really good. Can easily double the amount you get.

If you don’t mind boiling water, you can make a bunch of lo mein noodles and then mix in your Chinese food. Flat rice noodles for Thai.

Not take out, but a really easy I don’t want to cook a meal is a crunchy chicken salad. I buy those bigs of just bare chicken nuggets or tenders from Costco. You just throw them in the oven. When done I add them to a bag of salad mix. Southwest, avocado ranch or Asian all work really well.

Oddly in our area rice is an extra charge so we usually just make it at home but if your entrees come with the big boxes of rice and you have leftover you can make fried rice or a chicken/cheese rice dish or ground beef or chicken with whatever seasoning or sauce you have and mix the rice in. I like ground pork, ginger, Thai chili oil with rice mixed into it. DH like ground beef, bulgogi sauce and rice mixed in.

[Anonymous]

Buy chipotle bowl but make tacos at home with it.

I can make 8-10 tacos

[Anonymous]

I add ‘extra everything free’ to my chipotle burrito bowl order. Two - three meals for me….depending on how hungry I am.