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I began baking bread after my daughter MK was born in 1994. You may think I’ve been merely nourishing my children—or perhaps poisoning them depending on your bread stance—but I like to think of myself as a revolutionary in the kitchen.
The concept of bread labor played a key role in Gandhi’s philosophy of non-violent resistance. He (and Tolstoy) believed that everyone must perform physical labor in order to earn his or her living—or bread. To do otherwise amounted to stealing someone else’s labor and living off the backs of others.
I perform my bread labor literally. I bake bread (and most everything else) from scratch not only to reduce my waste but also to increase my self-sufficiency and thus abate my dependence on corporations, even if by just a small amount. Maybe it is an utterly futile exercise, as my increasingly cynical 13-year-old daughter Charlotte claims. But I won’t go down without at fight. And I’ll eat well as I go.
MK baked some rye-caraway bread recently that had passed its best-before date. I couldn’t just throw out the fruits of her labor, so I needed to do something with it. Ordinarily, I would have whipped up some French toast, but rye-caraway French toast? Maybe not. I decided to make bread crumbs. I used them to cook meatballs with homemade tomato sauce for my cynical meatball eater.
Whether you buy bread or bake it, you can use up any stale leftovers with the following (mostly Alton Brown) recipe.
Ingredients
- 10 ounces stale bread
- 1 tbsp dry herbs if desired, such as oregano, basil, and parsley; or sage, rosemary and thyme
- 1/4 tsp kosher salt
Directions
1. Preheat oven to 300 degrees F.
2. Cut bread into 1-inch cubes.
3. Place bread cubes in blender with herbs and salt. I skipped adding herbs because the bread I used had lots of caraway seeds in it.
4. Replace lid and pulse blender on low until coarse crumbs form. I did this in two batches.
5. Spread crumbs evenly onto baking trays. I had enough for two trays.
6. Bake in oven for 5 to 10 minutes or until crumbs begin to brown.
7. When cool, transfer to air-tight glass containers and use within two weeks.
The meatballs I made were delicious. You can also use bread crumbs for:
- Eggplant parmigiana
- Thickening soup or stew
- Frying in olive oil and sprinkling on salad…or anything…
- Topping baked beans, macaroni and cheese, casseroles
- Bean burgers
- Crispy coating for frying
- Stuffing
Please let me know if you have any ideas for bread crumbs, or stale bread.
Bread Crumbs
Ingredients
- 10 ounces stale bread
- 1 tbsp dry herbs if desired, such as oregano, basil, and parsley; or sage, rosemary and thyme
- 1/4 tsp kosher salt
Directions
Yields 3 scant cups
1. Preheat oven to 300 degrees F.
2. Cut bread into 1-inch cubes.
3. Place bread cubes in blender or food processor with herbs and salt.
4. Replace lid and pulse blender on low until coarse crumbs form.
5. Spread crumbs evenly onto baking trays.
6. Bake in oven for 5 to 10 minutes or until crumbs begin to brown.
7. When cool, transfer to air-tight glass containers and use within two weeks.