breadbasket
noun
Did you know?
Breadbasket has been used as slang in English since at least the mid-1700s. (It has been used even longer to mean literally a basket for holding bread.) It can refer to the stomach as an actual digestive organ ("his breadbasket rumbled with hunger"), but these days it's more commonly applied to the general stomach area ("rested her hands on her breadbasket"). No one is quite sure of the exact origins of the use, but it’s likely that there’s some connection between the basket used to hold bread and the basket where the bread ends up after a person eats it. Breadbasket has also come to refer to an area that supplies an important amount of grain ("the breadbasket of the country").
Examples of breadbasket in a Sentence
Agnieszka De Sousa, Bloomberg, 24 Apr. 2026
For instance, at a local top-end restaurant on a first date with Stevie (Jake Borelli), Chris orders — The Gourmand doing double duty here in obsequious waiter guise — 15 dishes, from the breadbasket with 20-year-old balsamic to Cornish Game Hen with Baby Turnips.
—Christopher Smith, Oc Register, 20 Apr. 2026
At the same time, violence continues to escalate in the Artibonite region, considered the country’s breadbasket.
—Jacqueline Charles, Miami Herald, 17 Apr. 2026
Whether your family celebrates Easter with a festive brunch or dinner meal, there’s always room for a breadbasket.
—Mary Shannon Wells, Southern Living, 6 Mar. 2026
See All Example Sentences for breadbasket
Cite this Entry
“Breadbasket.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/breadbasket. Accessed 27 Apr. 2026.
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breadbasket
noun
