Dictionary

crunchie en · NOUN

Pronunciation

• /ˈkɹʌnt͡ʃi/
• (Australia) audio

Etymology

From crunchy. Use to refer to infantrymen in Vietnam is from their "crunching" through the jungle brush. Use to refer to white Afrikaners is perhaps from their supposed tendency to eat crunchy food.

Meanings

1. A somewhat granola- or cookie-like chocolate-covered sweet, served in bar form.
   • A different method and a different flavour from the usual brown crunchie. The recipe is easily doubled for a larger batch. 2000, Lynn Bedford Hall, The Best of Cooking in South Africa, page 207:
   • “Crunchie?” said Velvet, her face lighting. “I got them this morning.” “On tick still?” “Yes. She was cross but I swore we'd pay by Saturday.” In the gold paper was a chocolate stick. Beneath the chocolate was a sort of honeycomb, crisp and friable, something between biscuit and burnt sugar. Fry's chocolate crunchie. 1935, Enid Bagnold, National Velvet, page 18:
2. (plural-normally, qualifier:US Vietnam era military slang) An infantry soldier, a grunt.
   • To the subjective mind of the combat crunchie and cannon cocker, executing with his legs, sweat, and often his life, the grand designs […] 2016, Micheal Clodfelter, Mad Minutes and Vietnam Months: A Soldier’s Memoir, →ISBN:
3. (South-Africa, derogatory, ethnic, offensive, slang, slur) A white Afrikaner.
   • […]the tyranny of the rockspiders, crunchies, hairybacks, ropes, and bloody Dutchmen. Those were the names by which we referred to Afrikaners. 1990, Rian Malan, My Traitor's Heart: Blood and Bad Dreams, page 54:

Forms

Relateds

crunchies · crunchy