Easy Vegan Garlic Croutons, tasty and crunchy!

These Easy Vegan Garlic Croutons are so tasty and crunchy. They only take 20 minutes to prepare and bake and go great with soups and salads.

Garlic – Truely a King Amongst Vegetables (and spices)!

Not only does it have an amazing flavour and versatility when it comes to adding to other foods, but it has some great health benefits too!

Low in calories – with approximately 4½ calories per clove; each clove contains magnesium, selenium, vitamin C, vitamin B6, and small amounts of B1, and small amounts of many other vitamins and minerals.

If you are from the UK or come to visit, be sure to get yourselves across to the Isle of Wight and visit the fabulous Garlic Farm – they grow and sell all manner of garlic products to eat and drink; if you are a garlic lover, you will not be disappointed!

Have you already been to The Garlic Farm on the Isle of Wight? Did you love it as much as I do? If so, please leave a comment in the comments box.

One thing to be wary of though is that garlic can come in all different sizes and, if a recipe calls for (as this one does) large cloves, you may want to add a couple of extra cloves if your garlic is on the small side. An average clove weighs 3g and I would call a clove that weighs about 5g a large one.

How to make these very tasty Easy Vegan Garlic Croutons

Step 1 – Preheat the oven to 180℃ fan /200℃/400 ℉/Gas 6, and make sure you have a shelf near the top of the oven. It’s always good to check this whilst the oven is cold as you lose valuable heat if you have to move shelves around when ready to put your food in the oven.

Step 2 – Place an oven tray in the oven to preheat. By doing this the croutons will start to cook from the heat as soon as they go on the tray, reducing the time it takes to make them lovely and crispy.

Step 3 – Cut the bread into 2cm / ½ inch cubes (this is an approximate size). I start by slicing the bread into 2cm thick slices. I also like to leave the crust on but this is down to personal choice. Just remember, if you do cut the crusts off, weigh the bread after.

Note – It’s best to use stale bread when making crunchy croutons as it has already started to dry out. If too soft, it will absorb all the oil, which could lead to your croutons tasting very oily, rather than flavoured. If you haven’t got stale bread, and you have got time, once you have cubed your bread, leave it uncovered for an hour or so. This will help it to dry out. You are looking to coat the cubes of bread and not saturate them.

Of course, it will depend on what bread you are using (I have used a ciabatta as I like the holes in it), but next, I slice each piece lengthways.

And then each piece into cubes. But as long as you have cubes, it doesn’t really matter how you achieve this.

Step 4 – In a large bowl place all the ingredients except the bread and mix well. You can always prepare this ahead of time if you like as the longer the garlic is in the oil, the more the garlic will be infused into the oil. But it’s not necessary to leave it and can be used straight away.

Step 5 – Next, add the bread cubes and stir in the oil mixture to coat the cubes evenly.

Step 6 – Remove the preheated tray from the oven and pour the coated bread cubes onto the tray, spreading them out so they cook evenly. This is quite important so the heat can circulate around them which makes them lovely and crispy. Any mixture that is left in the bowl, I wipe it clean with a piece of bread and enjoy the flavour ????

Step 7 – Bake in the top of the oven for 10 minutes, until crispy. Ovens can vary so check them at 8 minutes and if not crispy enough at 10 minutes, bake for a further 2 minutes. In my oven, they always come out perfect at 10 minutes.

Step 8 – Serve on salads or in soup such as my creamy celery soup or my carrot & chickpea soup.

I would love to hear from you when you’ve tried these tasty croutons, so please leave me a comment in the box below ????????

Happy garlic crouton making and ENJOY!