When the floodgates of Spellman open for dinner at 5 p.m., students act like they’ve never seen food before. However, students still may find themselves with more food leftover than expected.

Due to the large portions of food served, it is sometimes impossible to eat it all in one sitting. Unfortunately, that extra food is easily wasted when tossed in the garbage. While it may seem strange at first, saving leftovers from meals may be more beneficial than one may think.

After only eating half of a hot entrée, you can easily wrap it up to take back to your dorm room. One of the best meals to do this with is chicken, rice and vegetables. Spellman has rice and vegetables almost every day and you can get grilled chicken from the grill station.

Instead of reheating your meal, add chicken broth and place the ingredients on the stove to cook up a simple soup. Chicken stock or broth is available at Deli Mart, so a trip to the grocery store is unnecessary as well.

You can pair a grilled cheese with your soup for a full meal. During breakfast time at Spellman or during the weekend breakfast buffets at LaPenta, bacon is often served in excess. Instead of throwing out leftover bacon, wrap it up and take it to go. With those leftovers, you can spice up a traditional grilled cheese for a lazy meal in less than five minutes.

Something many students don’t take advantage of is the fact that the Avenue Deli sells more than just Megahouses. Being a deli, “the Ave” sells all different kinds of cold cuts that you can buy in bulk and use back in the dorms. This will make your off-campus meal card money stretch, because instead of just buying one sandwich, you can buy enough meat to make several. You can even put them on the stove top using a frying pan and make hot, panini-style sandwiches.

The salad line is also always one of the longest in Spellman. Since there is only one size for salads, oftentimes students end up throwing away what could be an average or suggested portion size of salad. Instead of throwing it away or eating it all in one sitting, try and take back half of the salad so you could eat it with another meal like the bacon grilled cheese or leftover soup. The cold cuts from the Avenue Deli could also make for an easy, extra salad topping when in a pinch.

When leftovers are thrown away, so is the opportunity for an easy and free meal in the dorms. Instead of heading straight for the trash, head to the plastic wrap station instead and make a meal of your leftovers.