How to Make Bread Crumbs in 3 Easy Steps

Learn how to make bread crumbs at home for frying or baking crispy, crunchy foods.  In 3 easy steps, make fresh or toasted homemade bread crumbs that taste 101% better than no-flavor store-bought crumbs.  Use your favorite bread, including gluten-free bread.

If you like to make crispy foods or casserole dishes, you have probably used bread crumbs in your recipe. 

If you have used store-bought bread crumbs, you know how bland they can taste.  They also can get stale pretty quickly in your cupboard.

And if you are eating gluten-free, it can more expensive and a big pain to find gluten-free bread crumbs.  Making homemade bread crumbs is the perfect solution to these problems.

Fortunately making bread crumbs is quick and easy with a food processor.  Don’t have a food processor?  Learn how to make bread crumbs without a food processor.

Homemade bread crumbs taste better and you can store them easily to retain their fresh flavor.  Once you start making your own bread crumbs, you will never want to buy them again.

What are Bread Crumbs?

Bread crumbs are small, broken pieces of fresh or toasted bread pulverized into tiny crumbly pieces.

Use any plain bread (bread without seeds, nuts, large grains, etc.) for best results.

Bread crumbs can be either fresh or toasted and their texture coarse or fine.  You can make bread crumbs with the crust on the bread or remove the crust before processing.

Some people collect their stale bread and use it to make bread crumbs.  While this reduces waste, be aware that input=output.

If your bread is stale, your bread crumbs may taste stale as well.  How much you will notice the stale taste depends on how many other ingredients the crumbs are mixed with and how sensitive your taste buds are.

How to Make Bread Crumbs With Fresh Bread

• To make fresh bread crumbs, cube or tear two slices of your favorite bread into pieces.

• Place four to five pieces into your food processor.  Use either the coarse or fine blade, depending on the size of bread crumbs you want.  Pulse 5 to 8 times until the bread crumbles into coarse crumbs.
• Continue to add bread pieces and pulse until all the bread pieces are processed.

Finished bread crumbs will be soft.  Keep them from drying out by storing them in a zip top bag or airtight container until you are ready to use them.  Crumbs from fresh bread are best used right away.

Process bread crumbs longer to get a finer crumb.  Finer crumbs are ideal for breading, while coarse crumbs are wonderful as a casserole topping or as a filler for meatloaf.

How to Make Bread Crumbs With Toasted Bread

Step 1: Cube the Bread Slices (or break bread into pieces)

If you cube the bread slices, you will get more uniform sizes.  This can help get evenly sized crumbs.  However, you can tear your bread into pieces as well.

Step 2: Toast the Bread Cubes in the Oven

• Preheat the oven to 250° Fahrenheit.
• Next, place the bread cubes on a cookie sheet in a single layer.
• Put the cookie sheet in the oven and bake for 15 minutes.
• After 15 minutes turn each bread slice over and toast for another 10 to 15 minutes.
• Finally, remove the cookie sheet from the oven and let the toasted bread cool for about 15 minutes. Cool the bread on a cooling rack to cool it faster.

Toast Bread in Toaster Oven

If you will be toasting your bread in a toaster oven, do not cube or break the bread before toasting.

• Turn the toaster oven on to 250° Fahrenheit.
• Place the bread in toaster oven in single layers.
• Toast for 15 to 20 minutes. The bread toasts on both sides at the same time, so you don’t need to flip the bread over.
• Cube or break the toasted bread after it has cooled.

Note: I don't recommend toasting the bread in a regular toaster.  The toast tends to become crispy and dark on the outside while the inside remains soft.  Increasing the toasting time leads to dark toast, not suitable for bread crumbs.

Toast Bread in a Frying Pan

• Heat the frying pan to medium low heat using no fat or water.
• Place two slices of bread in the pan.
• Cook for 4 to 5 minutes on one side.
• Flip the bread over and cook for another 4 to 5 minutes. You many have to move the bread around so it toasts evenly.  When finished, the bread should be dry and toasted.
• If necessary, flip the bread over again, until the moisture has cooked out and the bread is toasted thoroughly.
• Remove from pan and cool.
• After toasting and cooling the bread, break each slice of bread into three to five pieces.

Step 3: Pulverize the Toasted Bread

The easiest way to process toasted bread into bread crumbs is to use a food processor.  I use the food processor on my Bosch stand mixer.

The Bosch stand mixer has several attachment blades.  I like the shredding blade placed at the top of the bowl.

The bread cubes go through the blade once and collect in the bottom of the bowl.  The size of the crumbs will depend on which food processor blade you use.

If you use your food processor blade inside the bowl, the bread will continually be processed when the unit is on.

If your food processor has the blade in the bowl, use the pulse setting and watch the bread cubes carefully, so they don't become powder.  In my opinion, powdered crumbs are only good for thickening soups.

• Add bread cubes a little at a time and process.
• Continue adding bread and pulsing until all the bread pieces have been pulverized.
• To preserve freshness, store the toasted bread crumbs in a zip top bag or airtight container until you are ready to use them in a recipe. Use within 2 days or place them in the freezer for longer storage.

How to Preserve Bread Crumbs

It is not always convenient to make bread crumbs right when you need them for your dinner recipe.

Instead, keep a supply of homemade bread crumbs in a freezer bag or airtight container in the freezer until you are ready to use them.  Be sure to label and date your freezer bag.

Always store bread crumbs with a coarse texture.  If your recipe calls for a fine texture, you can quickly pulse your supply of bread crumbs until you get the right consistency.  You can make finer crumbs if you need them, but you can’t make fine crumbs coarse again.

Frozen bread crumbs are best used within one to two months for ideal fresh taste.  If used after two months, they will not taste as fresh or flavorful.

It is easy to collect a supply of bread slices to use for bread crumbs.  I often use the unpopular heel or slices that have a hole in them; basically the slices that are not perfect.

Freeze these bread slices in a freezer bag.   When you have enough slices of bread to make a cup or two of bread crumbs, thaw the bread out and then make your next batch of bread crumbs.

Alternately, use a whole loaf of bread to make a good supply of bread crumbs for the next couple of months.

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Recipe

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What do you like to make with homemade bread crumbs?  Comment below and let me know.