bread and butter pickle
- noun
- /brɛd ənd ˈbʌtər ˈpɪkəl/
- US
Examples
-
She grabs a soft drink and a jar of bread-and-butter pickles.
Fiction book (1998) -
I love adding bread and butter pickles to my burgers for a sweet and tangy flavor.
-
The sandwich was delicious with a side of bread and butter pickles.
-
You can enjoy bread and butter pickles as a tasty snack straight from the jar.
Synonyms
A vegetable like a cucumber preserved in vinegar or salty water that you eat with food
A vegetable kept in sugar and vinegar that tastes sweet and sour
How Sweet
- US
- US
Surface Forms
Morphology
The phrase combines literal constituents so a learner who knows 'bread', 'butter' and 'pickle' can infer it denotes a type of pickle associated with bread-and-butter (i.e., used on sandwiches). However, the specific culinary sense (a sweet, thinly sliced cucumber pickle prepared with vinegar/onion/sugar and known as a named variety) relies on cultural/lexical knowledge and is not fully predictable from the words alone.
Etymology
Bread and butter pickle may come from the simple habit of putting these sweet, thin cucumber pickles on a slice of bread with butter. So the name reminds us that they are a sweet, crunchy pickle often used on 'sandwiches'.