chris fleming has done it again
this is VERY funny and I don't want to step on the gag but as a former food service worker I simply cannot NOT explain the place crushed Oreo cookies have in the service industry because I think it's really cool, actually
So Oreos! Truly a 100+ year old institution (although we can argue about whether Hydrox came first/are better but that's not what this is about). Oreo was manufacturing using pretty modern equipment very early on right here in beautiful Manhattan in the old Nabisco factory that is now Chelsea Market. But an unfortunate issue with mass producing millions of very thin, very fragile crisp cookies is breakage. A lot of the wafers (the chocolate part) will crack or crumble before reaching the end of the production line. The machinery can be adjusted to reduce breakage but the nature of the wafer means breakage will never be zero. Sometimes the cookie gets to the sandwiching stage & filled with the creme before it cracks, but more often it breaks before then. That's why you have some bits with creme and some without.
So what does a cookie company do with all the broken pieces? The dough is already cooked at that point so it can't be reused to form more cookies. So Oreo comes up with a plan: develop recipes and alternative uses so they can sell the crushed cookies, too. This happens a lot in manufacturing! Leftover bits are repurposed for other products to reduce waste and cost. Probably the most famous example is animal feed; the husks and rinds and cast-offs from human food production often get processed into animal food.
Sadly this means most commercial Oreo dust is a pre-crushed situation. I grew up working in my family's restaurant and the Oreo pieces would arrive in sealed plastic bag inside a big box. We'd use them for pie crusts and dessert toppings. Being a sneaky lil shit, I'd sometimes dip a soup spoon into the Oreo dust and take one big, chocolatey bite as a snack. No need to crush them by hand.
Sorry to add real-world facts to a very good bit. I just really love manufacturing. And cookies.
