Leftovers. If you end up with a fridge full of leftover turkey, roast potatoes, Brussel sprouts, carrots or parsnips, this is a great recipe to use up all those leftovers.

Turn your turkey leftovers into a Thai curry

This Thai green curry paste is quick to whip up and will add an additional zing to any leftover meat and veg. Just know that this is not a traditional Thai recipe but it tastes just as great. Fresh zingy flavours of lemongrass and lime with as much chilli kick as you like. You can make a big batch of this paste and keep it in the fridge or freezer for a quick mid-week meal.

Another note about the method. Thai green curry recipes usually start with cooking out the paste in coconut milk before adding other ingredients. This one is a variation as it uses the paste to marinate the meat before cooking. Then it starts with frying out the meat to get more flavour in it before adding coconut milk.

Both ways work. Just try it out and let me know how it goes.

Here are some other turkey recipes you can use all that leftover turkey with:

Minced turkey lettuce wraps

Turkey teriyaki rice bowl

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Leftover turkey Thai green curry

An easy and delicious way to use up all the Christmas leftovers that is not a sandwich.

Prep Time20

Cook Time30

Course: Main Course

Cuisine: Thai

Keyword: easy lunch, leftovers, no food waste

Servings: 4

Ingredients

Medium bunch coriander about 30g
6 hot green chillies
5 cm piece of chopped ginger or galangal
1 lemongrass stalk roughly chopped
3 peeled garlic cloves
Zest and juice of a lime
2 peeled and roughly chopped shallots
3 kaffir lime leaves

Instructions

Strip the leaves from a medium bunch of coriander and roughly chop the stalks, reserving the leaves.
Put the stalks, green chillies (deseeded if you prefer less heat), ginger or galangal, lemongrass, garlic cloves, half of the lime zest and juice, shallots, and kaffir lime leaves into a blender and blitz until the mixture is half blended.
Add the other half of the lime zest and juice and re-blend until smooth.
This curry paste can be made ahead of Christmas, frozen then either defrosted or cooked straight from frozen on the day of use.
Cut your leftover turkey into bite size pieces. To cook the turkey, use a few tablespoons of the curry paste to the leftover turkey.
Add a little oil to a pan and fry the marinaded turkey for a few minutes. You will start to smell the aromatics from the paste. You can let it sit on the hot pan, not stirring, for 2 minutes. The turkey will get caramelised (brown) whcih will add more flavour.
Then add the coconut milk and bring to boil. Then turn down to a simmer for about 5 minutes.
Add any leftover or fresh veg into the same pot and put the lid on for the vegetables to warm up or cook. Stir to mix.
Your meal is ready. Serve this curry with some steamed jasmine rice.

Notes

An even easier cheat is to buy some ready made Thai green curry paste and use that instead. I always keep a tub of this in the fridge as it is so versatile. I use it to make leftover curries and if I add some stock to it, I can use it as a curry soup base to eat with rice noodles. My favourite leftover quick lunch and no food waste.