crisp

Etymology

From Middle English crisp (“curly”), from Old English crisp (“curly”), from Latin crispus (“curly”). Doublet of crêpe.

adj

1. (of something seen or heard) Sharp, clearly defined.
   This new television set has a very crisp image.
2. Brittle; friable; in a condition to break with a short, sharp fracture.
   The crisp snow crunched underfoot.
3. Possessing a certain degree of firmness and freshness.
   It [laurel] has been plucked nine months, and yet looks as hale and as crisp as if it would last ninety years. 1820, Leigh Hunt, The Indicator
4. (of weather, air etc.) Dry and cold.
5. (of movement, action etc.) Quick and accurate.
   Stephen Ward's crisp finish from Sylvan Ebanks-Blake's pass 11 minutes into the second half proved enough to give Mick McCarthy's men a famous victory. December 29, 2010, Sam Sheringham, “Liverpool 0 - 1 Wolverhampton”, in BBC
6. (of talk, text, etc.) Brief and to the point.
   An expert, given a certain query, will often come up with a crisp answer: “yes” or “no”.
   Another way of writing the last example is 'She brought along her favourite food which is chocolate cake' but this is less concise: colons can give your writing lean, crisp style. 1999, John Hampton, Lisa Emerson, Writing Guidelines for Postgraduate Science Students, page 130
7. (of wine) having a refreshing amount of acidity; having less acidity than green wine, but more than a flabby one.
8. (obsolete) Lively; sparking; effervescing.
9. (dated) Curling in stiff curls or ringlets.
   crisp hair
10. (obsolete) Curled by the ripple of water.
11. (computing theory) Not using fuzzy logic; based on a binary distinction between true and false.
12. (of fabric) Starched and pressed (ironed).

noun

1. (Britain) A very thin slice of potato that has been deep fried, typically packaged and sold as a snack.
   "Go and get some crisps and pop," he said. 1971, Richard Carpenter, Catweazle and the Magic Zodiac, Harmondsworth: Puffin Books, page 33
   Turn you inside out and lick you like a crisp packet 2014, “Every Other Freckle”, in This Is All Yours, performed by alt-J
   As I sit in front of the TV angrily eating crisps, it comes to me. I will challenge her to a race. 2016, Steve Coogan, Neil Gibbons & Rob Gibbons, Alan Partridge: Nomad, page 44
2. (Britain, by extension, colloquial) A crunchy, savoury snack food made from potato starch, cornmeal or other starchy cereal grain, packaged and eaten similarly to the above.
3. A baked dessert made with fruit and crumb topping
4. (Britain, food) Anything baked or fried in thin slices and eaten as a snack.
   kale crisps

verb

1. (transitive) To make crisp.
   to crisp bacon by frying it
   c. 1752, Elizabeth Moxon, English Housewifry, Leeds: James Lister, “To make Hare Soop,” p. 6, […] put it into a Dish, with a little stew’d Spinage, crisp’d Bread, and a few forc’d-meat Balls.
   Eliza was fretful at his absences, and brought him his dinner crisped and dried from its long heating in the oven. 1929, Thomas Wolfe, chapter 17, in Look Homeward, Angel, New York: Modern Library, page 230
2. (intransitive) To become crisp.
   to put celery into ice water to crisp
   The dew is dried that drenched our hide Or washed about our way; And where we drank, the puddled bank Is crisping into clay. 1895, Rudyard Kipling, “Letting in the Jungle”, in The Second Jungle Book, Garden City, NY: Doubleday, Page, page 79
   Her hair feels fake, like a wig, but I think it is just crisping up under the dye and Frizz-Ease. 2007, Anne Enright, chapter 24, in The Gathering, New York: Black Cat, page 154
   […] the flick of the wrist with which one rolls the half-set wafer on to the handle of a wooden spoon and then flips it on to the drying rack to crisp. 2009, Hilary Mantel, Wolf Hall, New York: HarperCollins, Part 4, Chapter 2
3. (transitive, dated) To cause to curl or wrinkle (of the leaves or petals of plants, for example); to form into ringlets or tight curls (of hair).
   1609, Douay-Rheims Bible, 2 Chronicles 4.5, […] the brimme therof was as it were the brimme of a chalice, or of a crisped lilie:
   1630, Michael Drayton, The Muses Elizium, London: John Waterson, “The Description of Elizium,” The fift Nimphall, p. 44, The Louer with the Myrtle Sprayes Adornes his crisped Tresses:
   […] the well known rhubarb of our gardens, with roundish crisped leaves. 1800, Thomas Pennant, “China”, in The View of Hindoostan, volume 3, London: Henry Hughs, page 172
4. (intransitive, dated) To become curled.
   […] a few shreds of purple bloom on a brown, crisping tuft of self-heal 1972, Richard Adams, chapter 50, in Watership Down, New York: Scribner, published 1996, page 417
5. (transitive, dated) To cause to undulate irregularly (of water); to cause to ripple.
   1818, Lord Byron, Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage, Canto 4, London: John Murray, stanza 53, p. 29, I would not their vile breath should crisp the stream Wherein that image shall for ever dwell;
6. (intransitive, dated) To undulate or ripple.
   1630, Henry Hawkins (translator), Certaine selected epistles of S. Hierome, Saint-Omer: The English College Press, “The Epitaphe of S. Paula,” p. 96, Hitherto we haue sayled with a fore-wind, & our sliding ship hath plowed vp the crisping waues of the Sea at ease.
   1832, Alfred, Lord Tennyson, “The Lotos-Eaters,” Choric Song, V., in Poems, London: Moxon, p. 114, To watch the crisping ripples on the beach, And tender curving lines of creamy spray:
   […] the quick yielding of the waves that crisp and curl and ripple about my body. 1908, Helen Keller, “The Seeing Hand”, in The World I Live In,, New York: The Century Co., page 11
7. (transitive, dated) To wrinkle, contort or tense (a part of one's body).
   […] he consider’d what an infinity of Muscles these laughing Rascals threw into a convulsive motion at the same time; whether we regard the spasms of the Diaphragm and all the muscles of respiration, the horrible rictus of the mouth, the distortion of the lower jaw, the crisping of the nose, twinkling of the eyes, or sphaerical convexity of the cheeks, with the tremulous succussion of the whole human body: 1741, Alexander Pope, chapter 10, in Memoirs of Martinus Scriblerus, Dublin: George Faulkner, page 82
   Phillotson saw his wife turn and take the note, and the bend of her pretty head as she read it, her lips slightly crisped, to prevent undue expression under fire of so many young eyes. 1895, Thomas Hardy, Jude the Obscure, New York: Harper, published 1896, Part 4, Chapter 3, p. 266
   […] a slow torsion and crisping of all his nerves, beginning at his ankles, spread to every corner of his body till he had to shut his fists and teeth against the blind impulse to leap from his bed screaming. 1914, Frank Norris, chapter 15, in Vandover and the Brute, Garden City, NY: Doubleday, Page, pages 242–243
   Ah, here was a fellow coming! And instinctively he crisped his hands that were buried in his pockets, and ran over to himself his opening words. 1915, John Galsworthy, chapter 27, in The Freelands,, London: Heinemann, page 252
   They [the shark’s teeth] were shaped like a man’s fingers when they are crisped like claws. 1952, Ernest Hemingway, The Old Man and the Sea, New York: Scribner
8. (intransitive, dated) To become contorted or tensed (of a part of the body).
   […] she gave no sign of the wave of repugnance that swept over her except that her fingers suddenly crisped. 1935, Edgar Wallace, Robert G. Curtis, chapter 10, in The Man Who Changed His Name,, London: Hutchinson
9. (transitive, intransitive, rare) To interweave (of the branches of trees).
   […] the hot pavement by the playing field where the trees crisp together. 1938, Lawrence Durrell, The Black Book, Open Road Media, published 2012, Book 2
10. (intransitive, dated) To make a sharp or harsh sound.
    […] everything had become so still that the crisping of the snow under foot might be heard nearly half a verst round. 1860, Nikolai Gogol, “The Night of Christmas Eve: A Legend of Little Russia”, in George Tolstoy, transl., Cossack Tales, London: Blackwood, page 1
    […] the wheels [of the carriage] made their little crisping over the fine metal of the driveway. 1904, Harry Leon Wilson, chapter 10, in The Seeker, New York: Doubleday, Page, page 239
    1915, Clotilde Graves (as Richard Dehan), “A Dish of Macaroni” in Off Sandy Hook, New York: Frederick A. Stokes, p. 39, […] her light footsteps and crisping draperies retreated along the passage,
    The same peculiar crisping or crackling sound […] was heard this morning in every direction […] the ‘noise accompanying the aurora,’ 1915, Elisha Kent Kane, chapter 16, in Adrift in the Arctic Ice Pack, New York: Outing Publishing Company, published 1916, page 291
    Jericho had placed in my hand a glass in which the bubbles broke with a crisping sound. 1948 November, Max Brand, “Honor Bright”, in The Cosmopolitan
11. (transitive, dated) To colour (something with highlights); to add small amounts of colour to (something).
    It was the form of a man of middle age, the hair white, but the beard only crisped with grey, 1876 December, Margaret Oliphant, “The Secret Chamber”, in Blackwood’s Edinburgh Magazine, volume 120, page 718
    […] Monte Pellegrino, a huge, inordinate mass of pinkish rock, hardly crisped with the faintest vegetation, looming up to heaven from the sea. 1921, D. H. Lawrence, chapter 2, in Sea and Sardinia, New York: Thomas Seltzer, page 55
    The leaves of the chestnut were crisped with gold. 1925, Warwick Deeping, chapter 7, in Sorrell and Son, New York: Grosset & Dunlap, published 1926, page 66