Once you learn how easy it is to make your own breadcrumbs and you taste the difference in your cooking, you'll never buy them from a store again!
Homemade fresh, fluffy breadcrumbs made in seconds in the food processor.
When I was little, I'd watch my grandmother make her own breadcrumbs. She took plain, seedless, hard rolls that she bought at the local bakery and had them sit out on the counter for a few days until they became a bit stale and were solid enough to grate. When the rolls were ready, she would take an old-fashioned hand grater and set it atop a bowl and rub the bread back and forth over the blades, until the best homemade breadcrumbs in the world appeared.
If you ever had a dish using homemade fresh breadcrumbs, you know there's a huge difference between those and store bought ones. You'll never want to go back to the crumbs in a canister after tasting the difference.
My grandmother's method took time. It was work. And when I learned how to do this, I remember scraping my knuckles on the grater a few times by accident, too - Ouch!
In effort to produce the same results, with a lot less skin flakes in the bowl, and save my hands from some wear and tear, I figured that there's got to be a better way to do this in the 21st century. There is; and this is what you do.
The uses for these fresh breadcrumbs are endless! In the coming weeks I'll give you some ideas. But for now, try sprinkling these crispy, light crumbs on your casseroles, macaroni and cheese, or revamp your Southern fried chicken.
Ingredients:
1 seedless hard roll, frozen (Not the hot dog or hamburger kind! The kind you would use for a hearty sandwich or sub/hoagie is what I mean.)*
Instructions:
1. Take a roll out of the freezer and dust off any ice crystals that may have formed.
2. Cut the roll into big chunks that will easily fit into the chute of your food processor. Work quickly because you want the bread to be hard and frozen so you wind up with crumbs and not mush.
The bread remains fresh because it was frozen as soon as it arrived at home. As the food processor makes crumbs out of the bread, it instantly thaws out, without becoming a mushy mess.
3. Set up the grating blade in your food processor.
4. Fill your food processing chute with chunks of the frozen roll, one at a time, and grind away. That's it!
Special Notes:
*I usually buy about 6 or so rolls from the bakery at a time. I freeze them individually in Ziploc bags as soon as I get them home. Then, when I want some fresh breadcrumbs, I take one out and do my thing.
You can also substitute any good quality bread (not Wonder Bread here!) and do the same thing. You can introduce new textures and flavors to your food if you try using sour dough bread, instead, for example.
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