If you have ever looked at the praise of croutons, you will know it can cost you two or three dollars for a single box. And bread crumbs can be just as expensive. But you can very easily make your own simply by using your leftover bread and bread crusts.

Whenever you finish a loaf of bread, and you have those and pieces left, toss them into a freezer Ziploc bag. Once you have accumulated enough you can either make bread crumbs or croutons simply out of your free leftovers.

If you need fine bread crumbs, an easy way to do is simply to remove your frozen bread and thin crusts, then use a mallet to crush them. If you're planning to reuse the freezer bag for future crust bags, place the frozen bread into a grocery bag or another plastic bag first.

If you plan to make croutons or coarse breadcrumbs, cut or tear the bread into appropriately sized pieces before you pop them into Ziploc bag for the freezer.