HTCEB: Croutons

The other day, I was still riding the hype train of being able to cook at home, despite it being 90 degrees with no air conditioning. I decided to prep my croutons that I'll be putting on top of salad later in the week (Boyfriend had a great idea to throw them on top of the gazpacho later as well).

There's an awesome local bakery in Detroit, Avalon International Breads, and I was so thrilled to see some of their products over at Whole Foods. I selected an Avalon Italian-style bread to use for my croutons.

 I took 8 slices, including the smaller end piece, and slathered them in room temp butter.

 I cut them with a bread knife into approximately half inch/one inch chunks. I spread them in an even layer on a baking sheet and popped them into a 400-degree oven.

I tossed them, initially, after two minutes, which was way too soon. They were still really pale white and just barely toasted. for the remainder of the 20-minute cooking process, I waited 5 minutes between each toss. In the future, I would probably take them out closer to the 15-minute mark. Either way, when I took them out, they had a nice deep golden color. When I put them on a salad later in the week, they were beautifully crisp and a great topping (spoiler alert: they were great in the gazpacho, too).

Keep an eye out for posts featuring the salad and the gazpacho, btw.

This recipe is:
-Vegetarian

This is the 2nd recipe I made from How to Cook Everything: Basics.