Artforum

Chip dust is like regular dust: the ultimate ambient material, always collecting rather than collected. Though we sometimes eat it, chip dust is born in the bottom of bags and for the most part stays there. It's a natural artifact of chip bags with corners. To my knowledge, there is no way to eat every last granule of flavor. The result is a desert of chip dust thrown away over time. How then, to create a machine for producing chip dust directly -- a machine for 'snacking strong'? Would this machine crush existing chips to create dust? Adding a pulverizing device to existing factory lines would be simple. Like coffee, dust could be ground to different levels of potency. Or would the dust have to be harvested? Maybe a machine slowly shakes chips until they are bare. Or perhaps harvesting dust would require some kind of dust ranch, where chips are planted in the ground, row by row for acres, waiting for wind to denude them of dust. The fragility of chips might require that each chip is hand-dusted, driving the price of chip dust even higher, to saffron levels. High dust prices seem unavoidable. Dust futures are poised to grow, as chip dust is likely to go bad much slower than whole chips, creating an opportunity for collectors and speculators. A future bag of bodega-aged Cool Ranch dust might fetch hundreds of dollars. In fact, it's easy to imagine a scenario where manufacturing chips on their own becomes unprofitable. The wheat becomes the chaff. Chip brand names persist only as vestiges of an era where we ate chips, not dust. No one can remember when Doritos meant anything but Dust.

—Jeff Sisson