Bread Crumbs

If you're making homemade bread, you're bound to have a few crumbs.  Most of the crumbs come from slicing the bread, but there are always a few in the bottom of the empty bread bags, too.

It's common to just shake them into the sink or the garbage, but is there anything else!

Oh, yeah.

Since they're already dry, they don't spoil if kept fairly airtight.  I scoop them into a plastic container with a lid and save up until there's enough to do something with them.

Add to hamburger to extend it a bit
Use in  Meatballs
or Zucchini Cakes
coating for Chicken Nuggets

You can even use them as a substitute for oats or flour in recipes- 
1/2 c. crumbs = 1/2 c. rolled oats, 
1/2 c. crumbs = 1/4 c. flour

Or use them in place of graham cracker crumbs for a pie crust.  See below.

Crumb Crusts
1 ½ c. graham cracker crumbs 
¼ c. sugar 
5-6 Tbsp. melted butter 

Stir together crumbs and sugar, mix in butter. Press firmly and evenly in a 9” pie pan. Chill 1 hour OR bake at 375 degrees 6-9 minutes, til edges are brown (and it smells wonderful).  
Use a blender to crush the cookies/crackers, or a cereal box liner or big zip top baggie and a rolling pin
Breadcrumb crust:use dry breadcrumbs, increase sugar to 1/3 c. You’d never know!
Chocolate Crust: use 1 ½ c. crushed chocolate cookies (take out creme filling), don’t use the sugar in the crust recipe.
Gingersnap Crust: use all gingersnap crumbs or part gingersnap, part graham. Leave out sugar.
Nut crust: add 1/3 c. finely chopped pecans, almonds, walnuts, or other to any crumb crust.
Vanilla Crust: use crushed vanilla wafers, leave out the added sugar.

 
Try it!  (Now, won't you feel thrifty?)