ELI5: Explain Like I'm 5

Bread crumbs

Breadcrumbs are like tiny pieces of bread that have been dried out and crumbled up. Imagine you have a slice of bread and you rip it up into lots of little pieces, that's what breadcrumbs are! People use breadcrumbs for all sorts of things in cooking.

For example, when making meatballs or meatloaf, you might mix breadcrumbs with ground meat to help it stick together better and hold its shape.

Breadcrumbs can also be used to make fried foods crispy on the outside. Imagine you want to fry some chicken. First, you would coat the chicken in some kind of wet mixture like egg, and then you would roll it in breadcrumbs. This makes a crunchy coating that helps keep the chicken from getting soggy in the oil.

You can also sprinkle breadcrumbs on top of casseroles, mac and cheese, or other dishes to give them a crunchy topping. It's kind of like putting sprinkles on ice cream!

So, in summary, breadcrumbs are tiny pieces of dried up bread that you can use to help hold foods together, create a crunchy coating, or add some extra texture to a dish.