Word.ws English Dictionary

bread-and-butter

bread-and-butter is the alternative form of bread and butter.

Adjective

bread-and-butter (comparative more bread-and-butter, superlative most bread-and-butter)

  1. Relating to basic sustenance or the requirements for everyday living.
    • These road warrior plays were fronted by former semistars like Forrest Tucker or Hugh O'Brian, who had had their bread-and-butter TV shows cancelled. The job could pay $3,000 to $5,000 a week […]2015, Robert Crane, Christopher Fryer, Crane: Sex, Celebrity, and My Father's Unsolved Murder, page 34
  2. Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see bread, and, butter.
    • bread-and-butter pudding

Interjection

  1. (archaic) A general saying used to ward off bad luck
  2. (archaic) A saying specifically used to ward off bad luck when separating hands to walk either side of a tree

Meaning of bread and butter

Noun

bread and butter sg or pl

  1. (idiomatic, plural, singular) That which is central or fundamental, as to one's business, survival, or income; a staple or cornerstone.
    • They will do some machining if you ask them, but sheet metal has always been their bread and butter.
  2. (idiomatic, plural, singular) The basic requirements of living, such as food and housing.
    • What the nation, like the man, earns for itself by the honest labor of its people—when a man exerts himself to anything in an honorable calling—he is said to be earning his bread and butter, which includes his food and clothes and house-rent and all the rest of the thing [sic] he pays for. Now, if...1897, Annual Report, Volume One, Ontario Department of Agriculture
  3. (plural, singular) Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see bread, butter.
    • The bread-and-butter were good enough, but the ale poorish.1862, George Borrow, Wild Wales

See all 4 meanings of bread and butter

Forms of bread-and-butter

comparativemore bread-and-butter
superlativemost bread-and-butter

Origin of bread-and-butter

Reflecting that bread and butter are archetypally basic foodstuffs (daily necessities) in the places where the English language developed; compare daily bread, put bread on the table, earn one's bread, bread and water (as prisoners' diet or poverty diet), and know which side one's bread is buttered on.

Phrases with bread-and-butter

Questions about bread-and-butter

What does bread-and-butter mean?
Bread-and-butter means relating to basic sustenance or the requirements for everyday living.
What is bread-and-butter the alternative form of?
Bread-and-butter is the alternative form of bread and butter.
What part of speech is bread-and-butter?
Bread-and-butter can be an adjective or an interjection.

Words near bread-and-butter in the dictionary

  1. bread tree
  2. bread trees
  3. bread unit
  4. bread units
  5. bread wheat
  6. bread-and-butter
  7. bread-and-butter issue
  8. bread-and-butter issues
  9. bread-and-butter letter
  10. bread-and-butter letters
  11. bread-and-butter note

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: bread-and-butter (page history and authors); bread and butter (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this entry: “bread-and-butter.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/bread-and-butter. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.