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Leftover bread


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Your question has made me think back on german/austrian recipes I've seen--interesting ways to use fresh rye bread crumbs. I have rye bread a lot but haven't been too creative in using crumbs, etc. so I was motivated to investigate my cookbooks a bit.

"Gerostete Brotsuppe" (Toasted Bread Soup) is a rustic Austrian soup that uses dark bread as opposed to white bread used in the more common Viennese "Panadlsuppe". Dried rye bread is browned with onions and parsely in butter with a little flour. Some garlic also added towards the end. Beef stock and water are added and bread simmer until soft. Puree in blender and return to pot. In a dish blend 1-2 eggs, 2 T heavy cream and a pinch of nutmeg. Temper with soup; then add in to bulk of soup stirring constantly without coming to a boil. Serve garnished with some caraway and/or crisp croutons. (Other variations also have sliced carrots and/or meat added to the soup (sausages, frankfurters, ham). Can also blend eggs with sour cream instead.

(This is no way traditional that I know of---but with visions of paprika dancing in my head from ronnie-suburban's recent thread, I wonder if that might fit in... add in towards the end of sauteeing onions???)

I know you have rye and sourdough bread, but I found two interesting dessert recipes also that use pumpernickel/black bread fresh breadcrumbs:

Schwarzbrotpudding mit rotweinsauce (a sweet black bread pudding with red wine sauce; also has ground hazlenuts)

&

Schwarzwalderkirschtorte (Black Forest Cake)

The latter recipe has always intrigued me because I thought it might be less cloying than some versions of this cake which I typically don't like. I haven't tried it yet though. It uses a central european techniqe of substituting bread crumbs for flour and using separated yolks and whites to leaven. In the cake are also grated walnuts, chocolate and Kirsch. Cake layers are soaked with Kirsch, then filled with sour cherries and iced with Kirsch-Vanilla Whipped Cream. Covered with grated dark chocolate.... I need to try this soon!!!

My *basic* way to use up fresh/slightly stale bread is to make what my mom called "Austrian Hamburgers" or Fleischlaibchen--basically little individual meatloaves in a way that are pan cooked. I usually use white bread but I think it would also work well with others.

Soak bread in water, squeeze dry. Add to ground beef with egg, sauteed onions and parsely, s&p and little marjoram. Dredge in flour, egg, dried bread crumbs and cook in pan with a little butter/oil. After finished make a pan sauce to serve with by deglazing browned bits with beef stock. Add some grated lemon peel, s&p and finish with some butter to thicken. Simple but nice tasting especially with mashed potatoes or simple buttered boiled new potatoes. The sum is much more than the parts and the sauce is very good. Kids like eating these with ketchup.

Edited by ludja (log)

"Under the dusty almond trees, ... stalls were set up which sold banana liquor, rolls, blood puddings, chopped fried meat, meat pies, sausage, yucca breads, crullers, buns, corn breads, puff pastes, longanizas, tripes, coconut nougats, rum toddies, along with all sorts of trifles, gewgaws, trinkets, and knickknacks, and cockfights and lottery tickets."

-- Gabriel Garcia Marquez, 1962 "Big Mama's Funeral"

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Make a panade Recipe here http://www.weircooking.com/

Nice winesonoma!

Here also is a nice panade from Paula Wolfert's new book, Wolfert's, "Panade of Leeks, Mixed Greens and Cantal Cheese"

Edited by ludja (log)

"Under the dusty almond trees, ... stalls were set up which sold banana liquor, rolls, blood puddings, chopped fried meat, meat pies, sausage, yucca breads, crullers, buns, corn breads, puff pastes, longanizas, tripes, coconut nougats, rum toddies, along with all sorts of trifles, gewgaws, trinkets, and knickknacks, and cockfights and lottery tickets."

-- Gabriel Garcia Marquez, 1962 "Big Mama's Funeral"

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Bread holds quite well in the freezer, and doesn't take long to thaw. For some reason, it does not hold well in the refrigerator.

Jim

"Bread in the refer staled as much in one day as bread at 86 degree's

did in six." "store at room temp or freeze" McGee," ON FOOD AND COOKING"

Bruce Frigard

Quality control Taster, Château D'Eau Winery

"Free time is the engine of ingenuity, creativity and innovation"

111,111,111 x 111,111,111 = 12,345,678,987,654,321

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if the rye isn't too stale already, slice it, cut the crusts off, roll it flat with a rolling pin then use to line muffin tins. Brush with melted butter and bake till golden. Voila, instant mini-pie crusts. Fill with roasted vegetables; scrambled eggs + smoked salmon; sardines with onions + parsley...

Fi Kirkpatrick

tofu fi fie pho fum

"Your avatar shoes look like Marge Simpson's hair." - therese

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Absolutely Panzanella!

Wonderful salad, although your tomatoes probably dont have the flavour yet, being early Spring. Just be sure to remove the hard crusts.

Make Mozzarella in Carrozza, or Croque Monsieur, I love toasted sammies! :smile:

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I'd have to go with cheese fondue: Gruyere, a Riesling, Kirsch, and whole lotta garlic!

(Probably better with the sourdough than the rye, but after a few glasses of Riesling, who'll know?) :biggrin:

I'm a canning clean freak because there's no sorry large enough to cover the, "Oops! I gave you botulism" regrets.

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  • 2 years later...

I've been baking a lot of different breads, and there is always some left over by the time I start a new batch. I have been slicing, toasting and processing it plain for breadcrumbs, and cut some up for croutons (well shmeared with an herby olive oil). Apart from those, I am out of ideas. I am not fond of stretching chopped meat or fish with bread (well, a little for texture sometimes), and so use the crumbs for coating foods, mostly.

Do you have favorite ways to use up bread?

Miriam

Miriam Kresh

blog:[blog=www.israelikitchen.com][/blog]

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I like bread salad. There's a recipe here, but I just mix cubes of firmish bread (i.e., not supermarket type fluffy bread) with some chopped, ripe tomatoes, lots of olive oil and some good, red wine vinegar and let stand a bit and then add some red onion, maybe some diced cucumber or whatever I feel like.

I also have a recipe which I think I made up, although I'm sure it's not original. Fry lots of garlic and a couple of hot chillis in olive oil, spoon out the chillis and garlic and keep aside and add a couple of cups of coarse breadcrumbs to the oil and fry til the breadcrumbs are crisp and brown, then mix the garlic and chilli back in.

You can add this as a topping to all sorts of things ... I like to cook some pasta shells, mix them quickly with ricotta cheese and chopped parsley and serve with some of the garlic/chilli/breadcrumbs spooned over the top. I like the contrast of smooth bland cheese with the spicy, crunchy breadcrumbs.

Or you can make bread and butter pudding ... I like my bread and butter pudding very plain with just milk and eggs with a bit of sugar and some vanilla, topped with buttered bread and baked til the bread is brown and the custard just set. Makes a great breakfast cold!

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Aphra, those sound good, especially the crumb topping.

I did think of French toast and bruschetta right after I posted; never mind, I'd like to see other people's ideas.

Does anyone make brown bread ice cream? I have never tasted this.

Miriam

Miriam Kresh

blog:[blog=www.israelikitchen.com][/blog]

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BREAD PUDDING!

My favorite way to use up old bread or even biscuits that don't get eaten. Super simple, and totally decadent.

The other thing that's good is just a slice of the bread covered with a consomme or broth and then broken up and eaten. Or, if it gets really hard, pulse it in the food processor so it's still coarse, bind it with an egg and add whatever herbs you like, and drop it soup for fluffy dumplings.

And there are so many things to do with breadcrumbs! Browning them with butter and stirring into pasta is a classic- my grandmother calls it "peasant food." But you can also make a stylized tonkatsu, or if it's a sweeter bread you could coat peaches and fry them in butter and serve with ice cream.

I don't ever worry about my bread going hard- there are so many options!

Also, you could always take it to the park and feed the ducks. That's what we did when I was a kid.

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Arianna,

Could you give us your recipe for bread pudding?

We used to have a Mallorcan cook, Paquita; she couldn't cook, unfortunately, except for mayonnaise and bread pudding. Delicious bread pudding, she used to make, but her meals were disastrous. We'd get up from the table in disgust, leaving the food almost untouched, and my mother would find Paquita sitting in the kitchen and sobbing into her apron...she was very fat, I wonder what she ate. :unsure: But - this is not germaine. I'd still a like a tried and true, decadent recipe for bread pudding.

Miriam

Edited by Miriam Kresh (log)

Miriam Kresh

blog:[blog=www.israelikitchen.com][/blog]

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Soup. A garlicky, chickeny broth thickened with some crustless bread. Or make it with a parve broth and add some Parmesan. And of course onion soup.

Savoury bread pudding.

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stuffing (aka dressing) for poultry of course! Along the same line, savory bread pudding.

I make my sweet bread pudding freehand, because different breads & different stages of staleness in your bread will mess with you if you try to follow a recipe anyway. Just add eggs & cream beaten together with sugar and spices (I use mace a lot) till it's goopy enough, but not soupy, and mix in whatever fruit is lying around, and some dots of butter, then bake. :wub:

Do you suffer from Acute Culinary Syndrome? Maybe it's time to get help...

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I also make bread pudding. I posted my recipe in RecipeGullet - for "Mock French toast" which is simply Extra Rich Bread Puddingbread pudding baked the day before, (in a loaf pan) chilled overnight. Then it is sliced and cooked on a griddle just as you would French toast. The big advantage is that it is not as messy and even kids can do the cooking if the pudding is sliced for them.

I also make seasoned croutons, dry them, seal in vacuum bags and freeze. (5-8 minutes in a 400 degree F oven is enough to freshen and toast them.

I make various "flavors," herb and garlic using various herbs, black pepper and salt, hot pepper, curry, and cinnamon/sugar, mixed sweet spices, fennel, and for serving with squash or pumpkin soup, croutons dusted with pumpkin pie spice into which I have mixed a tiny bit of finely ground dried cipotle peppers.

Somewhere around here I have a "Bread" cookbook, which is a collection of recipes using bread, either commercial or home-baked, rather than a bread-baking book.

I also love bread salads, particularly a rustic bread made with Asiago cheese, torn into chunks and tossed with coarsly chopped tomato, onion and finely minced parsley.

"There are, it has been said, two types of people in the world. There are those who say: this glass is half full. And then there are those who say: this glass is half empty. The world belongs, however, to those who can look at the glass and say: What's up with this glass? Excuse me? Excuse me? This is my glass? I don't think so. My glass was full! And it was a bigger glass!" Terry Pratchett

 

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Somewhere around here I have a "Bread" cookbook, which is a collection of recipes using bread, either commercial or home-baked, rather than a bread-baking book. 

I forgot that I have a book like that too.. The Ace Bakery Cookbook

<iframe src="http://rcm.amazon.com/e/cm?t=egulletcom-20&o=1&p=8&l=as1&asins=1552855074&=1&fc1=000000&IS2=1&lt1=_blank&lc1=0000ff&bc1=000000&bg1=ffffff&f=ifr" style="width:120px;height:240px;" scrolling="no" marginwidth="0" marginheight="0" frameborder="0"></iframe>

(Disclosure - I have no connection to this book, but do share a publisher and photographer)

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Actually, I have two, Cooking with Bread by Adelaid Hecthlinger and Cooking With Artisan Breads by Gwenyth Bassetti and Jean Galton which I think might be of use to anyone who bakes their own bread.

I have made several recipes from the latter book, one a loaf stuffed with meat and vegetables that was delicious.

The other book is 30-some years old and I remember making some recipes when my family was still together.

"There are, it has been said, two types of people in the world. There are those who say: this glass is half full. And then there are those who say: this glass is half empty. The world belongs, however, to those who can look at the glass and say: What's up with this glass? Excuse me? Excuse me? This is my glass? I don't think so. My glass was full! And it was a bigger glass!" Terry Pratchett

 

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I've been baking a lot of different breads, and there is always some left over by the time I start a new batch. I have been slicing, toasting and processing it plain for breadcrumbs, and cut some up for croutons (well shmeared with an herby olive oil). Apart from those, I am out of ideas. I am not fond of stretching chopped meat or fish with bread (well, a little for texture sometimes), and so use the crumbs for coating foods, mostly.

Do you have favorite ways to use up bread?

Miriam

Squirrels and birds love it.

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I went away overnight and came back to find all these great suggestions! I've ordered Cooking With Artisan Breads, not only because it looks interesting itself, but because of andiesenji's reference to stuffed breads. Long ago I read a short story by Colette, "In the Flower of Age", where right in the first paragraph, a character says,

"I'm preparing one of those warm breads for them, stuffed with crushed anchovies in oil and sweet red peppers, with a pinch of thyme..."

I've always wondered about that warm stuffed bread.

Then, opening up Elizabeth David's An Omelette And A Glass Of Wine, I see this: an essay called "Crackling", in which she describes how to make a breadcrumb-grilled breast of lamb. She said that this dish "...needs a bit a practice and a certain amount of dash." The meat is braised with aromatic vegetables and herbs till tender; pressed, the bones removed, then sliced. The slices are egged-and-breaded and allowed to bake once more for 20 minutes, then butter (in my case, margerine or olive oil) drizzled over them; then they are grilled till a crisp, brown crust is formed.

Well, now I have a handful of ideas for using up leftover bread. I might have to start baking bread for cooking with.

Miriam

Miriam Kresh

blog:[blog=www.israelikitchen.com][/blog]

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i can't remeber the name of it but there's an american dish eaten for breakfast from louisiana that uses old bread. it's kinda like a pudding but it's savory with egg, sausage, and stuff like that.

bork bork bork

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