crunch

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

1. v. To chew with a noisy crackling sound.
2. v. To crush, grind, or tread noisily.
3. v. Slang To perform operations on; manipulate or process (numerical or mathematical data).
4. v. To chew noisily with a crackling sound: crunching on celery.
5. v. To move with a crushing sound: crunching through the snow.
6. v. To produce or emit a crushing sound.
7. n. The act or sound of crunching.
8. n. A modified sit-up having a smaller range of motion that reduces back strain and strengthens the abdominal muscles: stomach crunches.
9. n. A decisive confrontation.
10. n. A critical moment or situation, especially one that occurs because of a shortage of time or resources: a year-end crunch; an energy crunch.
11. n. A period of financial difficulty characterized by tight money and unavailability of credit.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

1. To crush with the teeth; chew with violence and noise: as, to crunch a biscuit; hence, to crush or grind violently and audibly in any other way.
2. To chew.
3. To act or proceed with a sound of crushing or crackling; produce a noise as from crunching anything.
4. n. The act of crunching; the act of penetrating, forcing a passage through, or pressing against anything with a crushing noise.

Wiktionary

1. v. to crush something with a noisy crackling sound, especially with reference to food
2. v. to be crushed with a noisy crackling sound.
3. v. slang to calculate or otherwise process (e.g. to crunch numbers: to perform mathematical calculations)
4. n. A noisy crackling sound; the sound usually associated with crunching.
5. n. A critical moment or event.
6. n. ) A form of abdominal exercise, based on a sit-up but in which the lower back remains in contact with the floor.

GNU Webster's 1913

1. v. To chew with force and noise; to craunch.
2. v. To grind or press with violence and noise.
3. v. To emit a grinding or craunching noise.
4. v. To crush with the teeth; to chew with a grinding noise; to craunch.

WordNet 3.0

1. v. reduce to small pieces or particles by pounding or abrading
2. n. a critical situation that arises because of a shortage (as a shortage of time or money or resources)
3. n. the act of crushing
4. n. the sound of something crunching
5. v. press or grind with a crushing noise
6. v. make a crushing noise
7. v. chew noisily