I am a big fan of eating leftovers for lunch. I find that most dishes even taste better the second or third time after they have had a chance to marinate in the fridge. If you have been following Spend Smart. Eat Smart., you likely know that I am a fan of both pizza and tacos. I almost always have the ingredients for those dishes on hand, and I rarely get tired of eating them.

One problem that I have found with making tacos is that my daughters take a very small amount of meat for their meal, and my husband isn’t the biggest fan of leftovers. To use up the taco meat, I love making the Tasty Taco Rice Salad for a quick lunch. Instead of feeling like I am stuck eating tacos for several days, I can create a salad bowl with the leftovers to keep it exciting. The recipe calls for the rice and ground beef or turkey to cook together, but when I am in a crunch and have taco meat already prepared, I like to grab a microwaveable pouch of rice or quinoa and use that with my premade taco meat in this recipe.

My favorite part about having tacos is eating them with chips, salsa, and guacamole. Salsa Fresca and Guacamole are easy recipes to make in advance and I enjoy using them as toppings for my salad. Get creative with your taco salad and use up other leftovers in your fridge. Sometimes I will add in things like leftover corn, chopped radishes, black beans, and cilantro. You really can’t go wrong with any combination you try!

What are your favorite taco toppings? Try them on top of the Tasty Taco Rice Salad to give new life to your leftovers!