Homemade Bread Crumbs

I learned a lot the day I decided to make homemade bread crumbs.  The most important lesson of all was this: no matter what those Internet women say, it is NOT easy.  Either I have (1) the wrong bread (2) the wrong oven (3) the wrong food processor, or (4) all of the above.  The first thing I did was bake my bread to dry it out.  Internet sites say for about 20 minutes. 

After 45 minutes I decided to break them into little pieces because it didn't seem to be drying out at all.  Then back in the oven for forever (20 minutes or so).

Still, when I threw them into my food processor a little at a time the bread just got stuck on the blades.  Useless!  This is what I ended up doing to create bread crumbs.

When I set out to make breadcrumbs by hand, I didn't think I would actually be doing it by hand.  I mean really.  Do you know how much effort it took?  It took about an hour to do all that bread.  And I got crumbs all over everywhere.  And my rolling pin has not recovered from the experience.  And here's what I got for my hard work.

Now you are probably asking why I decided to make my own breadcrumbs.  One reason is that I couldn't even find them in the grocery store.  They are not with the bread.  They are not with the croutons.  Where else could they be?  And at the time when I go grocery shopping there is rarely a worker about for inquiries.  And processed breadcrumbs are full of weird preservatives and ingredients (I bought my bread at a local bakery).  And to what end would these bread crumbs be used, you ask?  For a different recipe of meatballs which I did not entirely enjoy and ended up throwing away two servings of leftovers.  When I thought about putting them into the freezer I thought, 'I will never, ever eat these.'  So there you have the saga of the breadcrumbs.  I'm telling you: don't do it!  Use oatmeal instead.  Use anything instead!