You’ve probably seen it in the movies—or maybe at your local park: People love to feed birds bread. And birds love to eat it. Which begs the question: Can you safely add bread to your home compost pile without attracting avian attention? 

The answer is, conclusively, yes. Bread has high nitrogen content, meaning you can compost it as a green material. But you’ll need to do it carefully to ensure your pile doesn’t become a target for birds and other pests. Read on to learn the do’s and don’ts of composting bread at home. 

Tips for composting bread

Worried about adding bread to your backyard compost pile? Don’t! After all, bread and other kitchen scraps are just organic matter begging to be put to good use. These six tips will help you avoid pests and encourage your uneaten bread to decompose faster. 

Make sure it doesn’t include dairy

Yes, we know we just said bread can be composted, but this is the one exception. Bread made with dairy (think: croissants, biscuits, and brioche) shouldn’t always be composted in a backyard pile for the same reason cheeses and other dairy shouldn’t always be composted:  Because dairy takes a long time to break down in compost and is likely to attract unwanted pests. The good news is that most bread isn’t made with dairy.  However, bread-adjacent goodies like pastries and baked goods are, so it’s important to check the ingredients before tossing something in your pile. Remember, just because it seems like bread doesn’t mean it is bread (we’re looking at you, pound cake). 

Make sure it’s not covered in oil 

Dipping bread in oil and then sprinkling a little flaky salt on it is a treat — but it’s a treat that will keep your bread from being backyard compost-worthy. Oil slows the decomposition process because it takes a long time to break down, so you should avoid composting any bread covered in oil to the compost. You also shouldn't compost any bread cooked in oil or butter, like focaccia or naan, for that same reason. 

Break into small pieces

One of the best things you can do with your bread before composting is drying it out and tearing it into smaller pieces. That way, it’ll break down more quickly and is less likely to attract any unwanted pests. 

Mill can take care of that work for you. Rather than wait for old bread to get stale and then trying to break hard bread down into tiny pieces, just toss whatever is left of the loaf into a Mill food recycler. Mill’s powerful dry and grind system breaks food scraps — including bread — down while keeping all the good stuff intact — leaving you with dry Food Grounds that you can easily add to your pile. An added benefit? Food Grounds have a higher surface area for microbes to munch on, which leads to faster composting.   

Bury it in the center of your pile

A great way to keep pests out of your compost pile is to make sure your compost pile doesn’t look (or smell) like something pests might be interested in. That’s why it’s important to break down food scraps before adding them to the pile. With bread, you can go one step further and bury it in the center of your pile. This will be the hottest spot in your pile, which will help ensure that it breaks down quickly. It’ll also help ensure that the smell of the bread is masked by the layers of compost it’s sandwiched between. (The sandwich becomes the sandwich.) 

Wait until it’s moldy

Moldy bread is bad news — unless you’re composting. Mold on bread is one sign that the bread is decomposing, which means that part of composting’s work is already done. It’s also a good idea to compost moldy bread because mold is also full of microorganisms that benefit the composting process—it creates more food for bacteria and other microbes that help compost decompose. 

Aerate your pile frequently

Turning compost regularly helps to speed the composting process and helps with the elimination of odors. If you’re composting with items like bread, make sure you continue to turn or aerate your compost bin or pile regularly to keep the compost active. 

How to use stale bread

There are plenty of ways to give your bread a fighting chance and keep it fresh for as long as possible. However, if you’ve found your loaf has gone stale, there are some delicious ways to use up bread that’s up the hill but isn’t over it just yet.

• Bread pudding. Because you’re hydrating the bread with custard, slightly stale bread is ideal for bread pudding because the dry bread absorbs more custard. 

• Croutons. This is probably the easiest use of all. On a half sheet tray, toss torn-up bread in olive oil and seasonings of your choice. Then, bake in a 350°F oven until golden brown and crispy. 

• Panzanella. An Italian bread salad traditionally made with tomatoes and cucumbers dressed in olive oil and vinegar, panzanella is wonderful with toasted, stale bread that can absorb all the juices. 

• Ribollita. Another Italian classic, Ribollita is a soup that is thickened with bread — making stale bread the perfect option for it. When the bread hydrates in the broth, the soup becomes rich and delicious, and nothing goes to waste.

What to do with bread that’s gone bad

Of course, even the best of us discover our bread has gone moldy every now and then. When that happens, skip the garbage and recycle it with Mill. The Mill food recycler turns food scraps into food grounds that can be used as chicken feed, a soil amendment in your lawn or garden, or an addition to your home compost. It’s not as good as fresh bread, but it’s better than feeding it to a landfill.