A wicked challenge from NEO today !
FF: 8 DD: 10
I found this really tough going. Had to resort to getting help on a couple of clues in the interest of getting an already delayed blog out.
| ACROSS | ||
| 1 | CHARCUTERIE |
Mrs Blair wraps a tender rump steak in shop (11)
|
| CHERIE ( mrs blair ) around [ A R ( tendeR, last letter ) CUT ( steak ) ] | ||
| 7 | BOW |
Violin player Clara or Dicky? (3)
|
| cryptic def; clara bow was an american actress and a dicky bow is a bowtie | ||
| 9 | ENTER |
Conservative leaving America’s heart to submit (5)
|
| cENTER ( heart { american spelling } without C – conservative ) | ||
| 10 | ATEMPORAL |
Had MP spoken without consideration for time? (9)
|
| ATE ( had ) MP ORAL ( spoken ) | ||
| 11 | TOSCANINI |
Maestro to study in India (9)
|
| TO SCAN ( read ) IN I ( india ) | ||
| 12 | RONDO |
Letter on doormat contains music (5)
|
| hidden in “..letteR ON DOormat..” | ||
| 13 | RAREBIT |
Dish of baked brie rodent devours (7)
|
| [ BRIE ]* in RAT ( rodent ) | ||
| 15 | GENE |
Wilder say catlike mammal losing tail (4)
|
| GENEt ( catlike mammal, without its tail i.e. without last letter ); i guessed the answer prior to any cross refs and then had to use the dictionary to find out what the catlike mammal was. | ||
| 18/8 | CODSWALLOP |
Fish small — batter rubbish (10)
|
| COD ( fish ) S ( small ) WALLOP ( batter ) | ||
| 20 | DIORAMA |
Moon featuring in play’s miniature scene (7)
|
| IO ( moon ) in DRAMA ( play ) | ||
| 23 | BLANK |
Pound lender invests in space (5)
|
| L ( pound ) in BANK ( lender ) | ||
| 24 | RELEGATED |
Demoted Cardinal entertains envoy (9)
|
| LEGATE ( envoy ) in RED ( cardinal ) | ||
| 26 | CONGER EEL |
Fish gone bad in lobster trap (6,3)
|
| [ GONE ]* in CREEL ( lobster trap ) | ||
| 27 | MACAW |
Mother Watts circling about parrot (5)
|
| [ MA ( mother ) W ( watts ) ] around CA ( about ) | ||
| 28 | SIT |
Good person retaining current position (3)
|
| ST ( good person, saint ) containing I ( current ) | ||
| 29 | DEATH VALLEY |
End depression in US desert reserve (5,6)
|
| DEATH ( end ) VALLEY ( depression ) | ||
| DOWN | ||
| 1 | CREATURE |
Cute rear wobbles in wild thing (8)
|
| [ CUTE REAR ]* | ||
| 2 | ARTISTRY |
Blakey, say, is to strive for mastery (8)
|
| ART ( blakey, say; referring to the jazz drummer ) IS TRY ( strive ) ; had to google to find out about the drummer | ||
| 3 | CURIA |
Scoundrel one above a papal court (5)
|
| CUR ( scoundrel ) I ( one ) A | ||
| 4 | TSARIST |
Romanov apologist in Dire Straits… (7)
|
| [ STRAITS ]* ; neat clue | ||
| 5 | REELING |
…slippery sort in band having a dance (7)
|
| EEL ( slippery sort ) in RING ( band ) | ||
| 6 | ESPERANTO |
Neat prose lost in language (9)
|
| [ NEAT PROSE ]* | ||
| 7 | BARING |
Revealing report about first king? (6)
|
| BANG ( report ) around RI ( first king , cryptically read as R – I ) | ||
| 14 | BLOCKHEAD |
Criminal around Yale: he’s silly (9)
|
| BAD ( criminal ) around [ LOCK ( yale ) HE ] | ||
| 16 | TACTICAL |
Strategic first act in short talk (8)
|
| [ ACT I ( first act ) C (?? ) ] in TALk ( short i.e. without last letter ) ; what trick am i missing here for the ‘c’? ; that being said, we are generally taught that strategic is different from tactical | ||
| 17 | PANDOWDY |
Find fault with badly dressed dish (8)
|
| PAN ( find fault with ) DOWDY ( badly dressed ) ; needed help to solve this too as i have never heard the word before | ||
| 19 | SERIEMA |
Winger Mike appears in Italian league (7)
|
| M ( mic ) in SERIE A ( italian league ) ; needed help to crack this | ||
| 20 | DELILAH |
Student inside called up courtesan (7)
|
| L ( student ) in reverse of HAILED ( called up ) | ||
| 21 | ABACUS |
On which adders slide to and fro? (6)
|
| cryptic def | ||
| 22 | MAGNET |
Bar attracting certain elements (6)
|
| cryptic def; smooth surface | ||
| 25 | GAMMA |
Poor mark from school master (5)
|
| GAM ( school , as of whales for example) MA ( master ) |
Thanks Turbolegs and Neo,
I agree with your difficult assessment. PANDOWDY is new to me. Needed to check SERIEMA, but such a clever reference to Italian football.
Yes, tough. I came here (partly) to discover how to account for the 2nd C in TACTICAL. Nice to find it’s not just my cloth-headedness’.
Thanks, both.
I liked CONGER EEL and CHARCUTERIE. I am equally bemused by the “c” in TACTICAL and needed some help with SERIEMA, PANDOWDY.
I also could not parse TACTICAL.
Thanks for the blog , the clues started off well and just kept going .
I wonder if TACTICAL has had a late edit which has messed it up , does not seem to work and unusual to have ACT and TALk in both clue and answer . There may be some devious explanation .
The SERIEMA are quite primitive , the last surviving link to ancient terror birds .
Thanks Neo. Like others I had some difficulty, mainly in the bottom half where I eventually revealed a few answers. Nonetheless clues like CHARCUTERIE, TOSCANINI, CODSWALLOP, and RAREBIT made the effort worthwhile. DEATH VALLEY, by the way, is a wonderful national park filled with great hikes and ‘other-worldly’ views. Avoid it, however, in the summer months or you may discover how it got its name. Thanks Turbolegs for the blog.
I agree that this was largely pretty difficult; I had never heard of PANDOWDY, so failed on that one. The Web tells me it’s American, but I’ve never come across it–it must be a regional thing from some other region. I constructed SERIEMA from the instructions given–that was the only reasonable-looking place to plunk an M into Serie A.
Certainly tough – too tough for this hot weather. We only needed help for PANDOWDY (never heard of) and MAGNET (d’oh!). And we can’t understand the second C in TACTICAL; maybe Neo will drop by to explain.
A lot to like, though, including CODSWALLOP, DIORAMA and ABACUS.
Thanks, Neo and Turbolegs.
Thanks Neo and Turbolegs
16dn: When solving, I had the same thought as some others that tactical and strategic are usually taking as opposites, and have not found dictionary support for the words as equivalents in any non-technical sense. I also agree with others that the wordplay does not account for the second C.
17dn; It took me as long as it had for the rest of the puzzle put together to think of PANDOWDY as a plausible word to fit the wordplay and the checked letters. For anyone interested, Chambers 2016 p 1112 gives us “pandowdy (US) n a deep-pan apple-pie or pudding richly spiced. [Origin unknown]”. I have no memory of ever having heard the word before, but accept that there must be many words that I have either heard spoken or seen in print, but had no reason to remember them.
Azed almost had PANDOWDY , it was one of his Christmas pudding themes so it had a coin inside which might make it hard to search for on here .
Me @7: poking around further on the web, PANDOWDY seems to be both from New England and from the past–all the recipe sites mention that it dates from the colonial era (so ~250 years ago).
Too tough for me. Did about 2 thirds.
Pandowdy reminded me of stargazy, nothing alike of course. Seriema I still thought was re roundball until looking it up. And the c in tcal … qui sa? Curiosity is healthy, and fun, ta both.