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Turkey Recipes for Healthy Leftovers

By on December 23, 2013

We all know that there’s only so many things that you can do with turkey after Christmas, right? There’s turkey curry, turkey soup, turkey stew, turkey sandwiches, turkey casserole…. Need we go on? It seems that there is a common misconception that this is all you can do with your Christmas day leftover’s. You would be surprised at exactly what you can achieve with the main ingredient of turkey!

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We decided that it was time for Herinterest to take a closer look at imaginative and new ways to use turkey leftovers. We are sick of eating stodgy curries and dry sandwiches. We want something new and exciting and if we do, that means you do too!

We are determined to have a good Christmas this year without putting on too much weight so we are going to share with you the best recipes that we could find for healthy turkey leftover meals… Want to see what we found?

What about something like apricot, turkey and cranberry turnovers? It’ll take ten minutes to cook after ten minutes to prepare and will make 8 servings…

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You’ll need a few ingredients, of course:

  • Oil, salt, pepper, oregano, 2 cloves of garlic, and 2 small onions, mayonnaise
  • 500g of turkey – minced up
  • An egg
  • Dried breadcrumbs
  • Sesame seeds
  • 2 x 23cm shortcrust pastry in rolled sheets
  • 100g of each: cranberries and apricots

The recipe is actually super simple to follow – you throw some oil into a pan along with oregano, onions, garlic and pepper and once they are pretty much done, you chuck them in a bowl. In this bowl you should then add the turkey mince, salt and pepper, 4 tablespoons of mayonnaise (lighter is better) plus the salt and pepper. Give it a couple of minutes and then pop in the breadcrumbs and egg to stiffen it all together. Once this has been achieved, throw in the cranberries and apricots and give it a good stir. You should have 8 evenly sized squares made out of your pastry sheets and you’ll need to spoon the mixture on to them before folding into a triangle shape and sealing the edges with egg. You basically use the egg as glue to make them stick together – isn’t that smart? Once they are triangular and sealed, brush some more egg on the top and sprinkle a few sesame seeds on – this adds a lovely crunch to them! You’ll need to pop some salt on and make a hole in the middle so all that hot air can get out and then you’ll need to pop them into a preheated oven – 190C or Gas Mark 5 for about 25-20 minutes. You’ll know when they are ready!

These are a really easy way to jazz up some leftover turkey and they aren’t too unhealthy either! There’s about 400 calories per portion with these so maybe have one as a replacement for the meat in the main meal. You can accompany them with a nice spinach salad for a real super-food boost!

For something a bit greasier for the hangover, why not cheat and have a turkey and apple burger? This is definitely less calorific than a Big Mac, and each burger will have around 400-500 calories, depending on how smart you are.

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You’ll need some stuff to hand:

  • 350g turkey – minced up
  • 4 trimmed and chopped (finely) spring onions
  • 1 cored, peeled and treated cooking apple
  • 1 small orange – the rind only
  • 25g pine kernels
  • 75g breadcrumbs
  • Fresh black pepper
  • 1 beaten egg
  • Sunflower oil
  • 1 apple (whichever you prefer)
  • Healthy homemade mango chutney (or chutney of your choice), apple wedges in the place of chips, and bread rolls. Obviously a healthy bread roll is a good idea here as well. 

Again, you have a very simple recipe to follow and you can even do them in the BBQ if you want an excuse to get it out… In a large bowl you are going to want to chuck your turkey mince, spring onions, orange rind, grated apple, breadcrumbs and pine kernels. You’ll want to throw in enough salt and pepper to suit your taste too. Mix it all together so it’s good and mixed, and then throw in the egg. Once again, the egg works as a glue and from here you can gran the mixture and make four equal sized burgers. You could make 6 smaller ones if you wanted to – this is all down to you. Ideally you are going to want to let this burgers sit in the fridge for half an hour or so so they set hard enough to then cook, which you can do on a BBQ, in the oven, in a pan or even on the lean mean grilling machines that we’ve all got in our kitchens. We guarantee that these are tasty enough to suit your Boxing Day hangover, easy enough to make to suit your limited abilities, and moreish enough that you might not want to share them. You serve them with the chutney of your choice, an apple ring, in the healthy buns. You could even swap the apple slices for a healthy salad, or even make your own potato chips in an air fryer or similar for a healthy yet guilty pleasure…

These are just two recipes that we found simple enough to make with your bloated, hungover selves on Boxing Day. Don’t you think you could give them a go? Make sure you come back and let us know if you do!

Happy Eating! 🙂

You could always take a look at some of the other delicious healthy eating ideas we’ve come up with. After all, nobody wants to get fat over Christmas!

 **Photos of the delicious food were found on Pinterest.com!