“bread-and-butter”の意味は

BBCのコメディー、『The Thick Of It』を観ながらETC英会話のチャールズ先生のレッスンを受けています。

the Department of Social Affairsは、このドラマに登場する架空の政府部門。社会問題省と、なんとも漠然とした名前の省庁ですが、オーリーがの、その役割、存在価値について説明しようとしいてます。

Olly Reeder: No, wait. We say the Department of Social Affairs has been doing amazing work, bread-and-butter work, belt-and-braces work, the kind of work you people aren’t interested in cos it’s not shiny, shiny, media-friendly stuff. You are so obsessed with the media, You sickos
Hugh Abbot: Sickos.
Olly Reeder: that every time we try and … just carry on with our day. You don’t show up, so we have to call a big thing like this.
Hugh Abbot: On target, under budget…
Olly Reeder: Coalface politics.
Hugh Abbot: Yes, absolutely, I like that.Not wasting resources.Good, let’s do that.

Bread-and-butter means weekly or monthly salary or the source of the companies income, What company makes is their bread-and-butter, it’s what brings in the money. So what you do is your bread-and-butter that makes your salary. It can also mean what they actually do to make money, which is just reemphasizing what I’ve already said. What a company makes is their bread-and-butter. That is what it makes their company profits and everything.

— So can I say, “writing is my bread-and-butter.”

That’s right, “writing is your bread-and-butter.”

■出演
・ETC英会話のチャールズ先生

■聞き手
・青樹洋文

………

◆使用楽曲 (BGM)
“Toxic Rainfall” of some1else from ccMixter