Leftover Christmas ham, leek, tomato and basil pasta
One of the joys of the Christmas feast, is all the leftovers you have the next day on Boxing Day! It’s a tradition of mine to have leftover Aunty Pippa’s Christmas trifle for breakfast on boxing day, and then we always have some kind of lunch using leftover Christmas ham.
Ingredients
- 300-320 g dried macaroni elbows or pasta bows
- 1 tablespoon olive oil
- 1 tablespoon butter
- 1 leek thinly sliced, white part and bottom half of green part only
- 2 cloves garlic minced
- ½ cup chicken stock
- 125-150 g pottle sour cream
- 4-5 thick slices ham diced
- 3 tomatoes
- ½ cup basil leaves torn
- ¼-⅓ cup parmesan cheese finely grated, optional
Instructions
- Bring a large pot of salted water to the boil.
- Heat olive oil and butter in a large fry pan on medium heat. Cook leek and garlic, with a pinch of salt, for about 5 minutes until leek is soft and starting to caramelise. Add stock and simmer for a further 1-2 minutes until leek is very soft.
- Cook pasta in boiling salted water until al dente (just cooked) – this will take about 8-10 minutes. Scoop out ¼ cup pasta cooking water and reserve, then drain pasta and tip it back into the pot. Stir through sour cream and reserved pasta water.
- Stir through leek mixture and diced ham, and season to taste with salt and pepper.
- Cut tomatoes in half, scoop out seeds with a teaspoon (this is optional – you can keep the seeds in if your prefer) and finely dice. Scatter diced tomato and basil on top of the pasta (or alternatively you can stir it through the pasta).
- To serve, divide pasta between bowls and garnish with a little parmesan cheese if desired. Too easy!
Notes
Here is a quick, simple lunch (or simple dinner) idea to use up those Christmas ham leftovers. It’s super simple, quick and easy. Enjoy! This recipe would also be great cold – whip it up and put in individual containers in a chilly bin for a day at the beach! This recipe would also be great year-round with bacon instead of ham. Christmas has is also particularity delicious cut into slices, fried in a little butter and served with eggs and maybe some roast tomatoes for breakfast.
If you have leftover turkey check out this recipe (and here’s a great turkey recipe on that note), or if you have leftover cheese and roast vegetables check out this recipe.