Bread and butter

Now I could write a book on the role of bread and butter in our family!

As previously noted, it was thin sliced bread for weekday sandwiches and proper bread for the weekends. We had our bread delivered by Barry the Breadman, who worked for Wonderloaf bakeries. He had a range of breads: thin, medium and thick sliced, always white never brown or wholemeal, wrapped in greaseproof paper. Uncut tin loaves, or bloomers, or my family's favourite Cottage loaves, or Coburg (round with a cross cut in the top): crusty cobs which went well with crumbed ham as a treat!

Today we have sandwiches as a snack, for lunch or supper. But we had thinly sliced bread with every meal. It was important to have a plate with sliced bread and butter on the tea table, it was always there at my Nan's house (just in case I got famished between meals). But the most bizarre place for bread and butter to turn up was with a trifle!

I'll write more on what exactly went into this "trifle" later. But the bread and butter served two purposes. One was to fill any remaining holes in the stomach after the main course. The other was, of course, to mop up the delicious trifle juices!

My Dad always took great pride in making sure we were well provided for: even if that meant that all that was in the larder was a proper crusty loaf, and all that was in the fridge was good Danish tub butter, that was enough for a feast. (Except when all that was left was Ifit.)

Bread and Ifit

Sometimes I'd come back from playing out starving hungry and wanting some food.

"You'll spoil your tea" Mom used to say. "Here, have some bread and ifit."

When I got old I worked out that "you'll spoil your tea" was code for "I haven't got anything to give you" and "bread and ifit" was also code for "all we've got in the house is bread".

So what was this mythical "ifit"?

If it were butter, or if it were jam, or if it were cheese... you get the picture.

But this wasn't the cotton wool type bread we get these days, it was proper crusty bread with real flavour.

I remember when sliced bread came in, and Mother had to try it out. She soon developed the way to handle sliced bread: thin sliced for sandwiches, and proper crusty bread for weekends or a treat.

Thin sliced bread was a bit of a godsend. You could get more out of a loaf if you sliced it thin, and I remember her holding a bloomer loaf to her, buttering the end of it and then slicing that end off so thinly. However, Dad told her not to do it like that when she caught herself with the knife. (Modesty forfends that I should tell you what she caught - but I think you can guess!)

Thin sliced bread meant we could afford stuff to go on the sandwich. My favourite was Shippams Salmon and Shrimp paste. (Mmmm I'm salivating as I type this!) If you thinly sliced a cucumber and put the slices three in a row across the bottom slice, then spread the top slice thinly with the fish paste, that made it healthy too!

There was a reason for crusty bread at weekends. Dad would have a doorstop slice of bread (that is, a slice of bread over an inch thick) dipped in the fat of the Sunday roast. Oh yum! The practical reason for that was to take the edge off his appetite so there'd be more to go round. What a good idea!