Friends, readers, and confused people looking to buy bowls on the internet,

In the midst of genocide, poverty, war, and atrocities, we as a people must answer one truly important question:  What is the best chip, as determined by a March-Madness-style bracket?  After last year’s bracket to find the best cereal, we at the Punch Bowl present Starch Madness 2012: The ChampionChip!  How far will Cool Ranch Doritos go?  Could Pringles best barbeque chips in a heated battle?  What the hell are Munchos?  These and other conflicts will all be resolved thanks to votes from chip-eaters like yourself. Here’s how this thing is going to work:

Each day in the month of March, starting on March 12th, we will have polls on our Facebook page (http://www.facebook.com/pennpunchbowl) with some of the match-ups, and whichever chips in each matchup get the most votes will move onto the next round. After each round’s results are official, we will post a column with the results and reactions from our most prolific chip analysts. What will you get out of this, aside from a month of chip education and entertainment? Well, if you vote in all of the match-ups, you will have a chance to win bags of the new ChampionChip. That’s right, you might get some free chips out of all of this.

For clarification, this is a competition among crunchy, edible chips. If it doesn’t crunch, its ticket won’t be punched. Chocolate chips are not eligible, nor are poker chips. Despite some passionate speeches from Punch Bowl staffers, Fairly OddParents character Chip Skylark was also dismissed from contention. The chips in this bracket are the best of the best, and will proudly represent their brands and flavors in this storied tradition of pointlessly yelling about snacks.

We hope you enjoy our latest installment of Starch Madness.

Keep it crunchy,

The Punch Bowl