Earl Cooks Homemade Croûtons from "Turkey's" Homemade Bread

I am blessed with an ample supply of homemade bread, baked by my wife A.K.A. "Turkey". What this abundance gives is bread that is the perfect toast, or with butter, or any other thing you would use bread for. My wife bakes 2 loaves almost every week, and we eat about half a loaf  hot, right out of the oven, slathered with butter. We eat some during the week, but in the end we usually have almost a whole loaf left over when she decides to make a new batch of the golden goodness. This leaves us with a surplus and it is my job to find a way to use it. We put it in the fridge and go to work on eating the new loaves.

I can't stand to waste food, so I am constantly looking for ways to both preserve and more importantly use up this 'staff of life'. It might not be a problem, but we rarely eat bread with our meals, (I know, crazy right?), but it is the truth, and the reason we have so much leftover at week's end. Shat I am doing this time is croûtons! This is not new or revolutionary, and I can't really give a recipe because I change the seasoning with each batch, but here are the essentials:

—Slice your bread into slices as thick as you want your croûtons to be

—On a wire rack in a rimmed baking sheet, place your slices in a LOW oven (200-250℉) for 30 minutes to dry out. You are not toasting them here just drying them out enough to accept the seasonings you choose.

—After the 30 minutes, turn the oven off, but leave slices in the warm oven for another 30 minutes to complete drying.

—Remove the dried bread from the oven and the slices from the baking sheet.

—Cover the the bottom of the sheet pan with olive oil or melted butter or a combination of both depending on your tastes and the flavor you are going for

—To the oil in the baking sheet add your seasoning. This can include Italian herbs, Herb De Provence garlic powder, onion powder or any other seasoning you love. I wouldn't add a lot of salty herb mixes here though some would be fine. Dried herbs work great.

—Cut your dried bread in to cubes suitable for croûtons. Mine are about 3/4 of an inch, and ad to the seasoned oil.

—Toss the cubes or just move them around the pan until all of the oil and seasonings are on the bread. You may want to add a bit more to the top, which can be done by spraying or drizzling more oil and sprinkling with more seasonings. I find fresh cracked pepper added here a delight. Adding Parmesan cheese or another finely grated hard cheese also works when added here.

—Return the seasoned cubes to a low oven again, but you want a bit of toasting this time. I turn the broiler element on to make the heat more direct.

—After 30 minutes, turn oven off. Test for crispness. If they are to your liking, remove them now. I find that leaving them an additional 30 minutes in the oven, heat of gets the last bit of moisture out and leaves everything crunchy and toasty.

—Remove and store in a zipper bag. They are now shelf stable and will keep for quite awhile.

I use mine in soups and salads, and they work great in stuffing recipes too! One more thing. If you have these you can cruch them and make a seasonded crum for coating fish chicken or for topping casseroles.