Make Your Own Croutons

These days, croutons are a snack that Rhett loves. To make him happy, I’ll usually give him a handful or two of handmade croutons, especially because our kitchen is always brimming with sugary delights.

Every kitchen should have these. Like French toast casserole or bread pudding, they are easy to cook and store for weeks, reducing waste and making good use of old bread. They are a real from-scratch staple that doesn’t need any processed ingredients because we love to prepare them with sourdough bread or leftover homemade bread.

Ingredients

The bread. You can use whatever dry, unenriched bread you have on hand; however, artisan bread or baguette would work best. For even browning without burning, lower the oven temperature slightly when baking enriched breads like brioche, as they bake faster.
Extra virgin olive oil. Here, I’m a big fan of butter. Lots of experiments confirmed my suspicion that butter, while wonderful for flavoring, doesn’t work so well with croutons. Instead of using butter, we’ll use olive oil since it produces more even browning and better crispiness.
One clove of garlic. You can use whatever garlic you happen to have on hand, whether it’s fresh garlic or garlic powder. Garlic powder is a good substitute for store-bought pre-minced garlic, since I’m not a fan of that kind of garlic.
Blends of spices. Things like garlic powder, black pepper, and Italian seasoning (in place of raw garlic, of course!). Naturally, salt is essential for flavor; if you happen to have fine, flaky sea salt on hand, that’s even better; otherwise, regular table salt will do.
The cheese is known as parmesan. This is not required, but it adds flavor and makes the croutons even better with tomato soup. You can use either pre-grated or freshly grated cheese.