Bread and Butter
This idiom has two meanings. The first refers to your job or vocation, which comes from the thought that you can’t eat if you can’t make a living. No job means no “bread and butter” on the table.
The second meaning refers to a couple: bread and butter together, meaning they can’t be separated. This comes from the notion that it is nearly impossible to separate the two elements once butter is melted onto bread.
The expression was first used as an exclamation when two people walking side by side were momentarily separated by something coming between them. The earliest citation of this comes from The Federal Writer Project's “Guide to Kansas,” published in 1939. In it, “bread and butter” was described as an incantation among schoolchildren in the area.
Wendell Smith
What about a Meat and Potato type guy? Or Chopped Liver? or Sour Grapes? Or Plain Vanilla? The list could go on.....
The Reluctant Gourmet
Yes Wendell, all great and I will work on the etymologies of them so we know where they came from. Thanks for sending these in.