March 17, 2015 - 5:05pm
Best bread for croutons.
I've been trying to incorporate more salad into my diet and I've been fairly good at coming up with one dish hearty salad recipes. For both flavour and for some carbs I like croutons.
The catch is that my usual french bread makes rock hard crouton and I don't like all the additives in commercially prepared croutons. Not to mention the fact that it feels like I'm less of a baker to not be making my own (as I have the time atm)
Any suggestions on making less (potential) tooth shattering croutons, or a better bread recipe to start with?
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the airiness of the ciabatta means that you won't have the density of a french bread. So even if the crouton is supposed to be crisp and crunchy, there's plenty of open space in the crumb for your jaws to work through.
alan
There are other considerations. For instance, if you want more strongly flavored croutons, you can use a bread that contains olives, roasted red peppers, parmesan, etc.
As for texture, how crunchy they are depends on the method you use. How long you bake or fry them and at what temp both matter. Note that if you use various breads, using the same time and temp every time won't automatically produce similar results. The size of the cut pieces can matter too.
and baked to fried as well. You can use olive oil in place of butter. 3/4 " squares, i usually put the oil on first and toss to coat then the Italian herbs, onion and garlic powder, salt and pepper and a bit smoked paprika and then put them on this....Nothing like a great salad for lunch and dinner Good luck with your salad making.