Leftovers are the Best

I made corned beef for St. Patrick’s Day, in true American tradition. I did not have cabbage, which had been far more popular than meat and potatoes at the grocery store I visited. Apparently the prospect of a pandemic quarantine makes people want to buy cabbage or perhaps it just means that restocking the cabbage takes a back seat to more significant items. I had Brussels sprouts instead.

The best part wasn’t the March 17 meal, but the subsequent grilled corned beef sandwiches on rye, with mustard and quick pickled onions. Similarly, the best part of making a big bean soup isn’t the soup. It is having leftover bean soup for tacos.

Why, you could be forgiven for asking, must we have the corned beef and potatoes and cabbage and carrots? Why must we have the bean soup?

Part of the charm is the deeper flavors and the complex combinations facilitated by the leftover meal, of course.

Part of the charm of the glorious leftover meal is that the preparation of the ostensibly main meal takes on much of the labor and virtually all of the decision-making of the leftover meal to come. The leftover meal is a bonus! This is meal-planning for those who don’t meal plan.

Simply starting a day ahead and waiting could result in those two goals. And I am here to suggest that this would be a big mistake. The disposition (definition 2 d on https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/disposition ) would be wrong. The process would be wrong. The corned beaf sandwich would not be the same in a new, efficient context. Just make the bean soup and eat it. Look forward to having the tacos tomorrow.

Corned beef on March 17.