The usual well-constructed puzzle from Quixote. There was nothing very controversial – maybe a couple of slightly unusual words in 21 and 4, but they were easy enough to work out from the clue.
| Across | |||
| 1. | It’s not soft bread that is passed across the counter (4,4) | ||
| Hard Cash | CD (bread = slang for money) | ||
| 5. | Shelter in a poor district around end of day (6) | ||
| Asylum | A slum around [da]y | ||
| 10. | Release snake attached to relation with no end of force (7) | ||
| Unclasp | Uncl[e] + asp (no end of force = remove last letter of force). If you’re not familiar with an asp, try the following. | ||
| 11. | Gangster with gun could make one frightened (7) | ||
| Alarmed | Al (Capone) + armed. | ||
| 12. | See me carting around a small weight (9) | ||
| Centigram | (Me carting)* | ||
| 13. | Animal seen in a road getting run over (5) | ||
| Llama | (A mall)< | ||
| 14. | Where gent lies drunk? Not behind this, we hope! (8,5) | ||
| Steering wheel | (Where gent lies)* | ||
| 17. | Gown wiper’s had to work – what might clean it eventually? (7,6) | ||
| Washing powder | (Gown wiper’s had)* | ||
| 21. | Old soldier turns up carrying painting (5) | ||
| Poilu | Up< around oil (painting). | ||
| 22. | Practical procedure to get the quince chopped up (9) | ||
| Technique | (The quince)* | ||
| 24. | Style created fancifully with little energy expended — nothing to it (3,4) | ||
| Art Deco | (Cr[e]ated)* + o. | ||
| 25. | Oiliness where things meet to get rid of jangling primarily (7) | ||
| Unction | [J]unction | ||
| 26. | Hesitation to speak with passion like Don Quixote? (6) | ||
| Errant | Er (=hesitation) + rant | ||
| 27. | It could be dead around about this place — or heavenly (8) | ||
| Ethereal | Late< around here | ||
| Down | |||
| 1. | Suspicion about a joint of meat (6) | ||
| Haunch | Hunch around a | ||
| 2. | Not entirely sure, can’t settle and takes back what was said (7) | ||
| Recants | Hidden in “suRE CAN’T Settle” | ||
| 3. | Mammal, one with growth of fur maybe on top (5) | ||
| Coati | Coat + I. | ||
| 4. | Generous pair to work, going beyond the call of duty (14) | ||
| Supererogation | (Generous pair to)* | ||
| 6. | Thus we had to circumvent barrier, being drunk maybe (9) | ||
| Swallowed | So + we’d around wall. | ||
| 7. | Non-alcoholic beverage, one sweet drink imbibed by the French (7) | ||
| Limeade | I Mead in le. | ||
| 8. | This crossword setter I had upset, colleague in a central position (8) | ||
| Medially | Me + I’d< + ally | ||
| 9. | Where one may get a shuttle service (9,5) | ||
| Badminton court | CD (shuttlecocks are used in badminton). | ||
| 15. | English priest keeps holy when meeting an immoderate character (9) | ||
| Epicurean | E curé around pi + an. | ||
| 16. | Like a sort of power source getting ruined in a wet shop (3-5) | ||
| Two phase | (A wet shop)* | ||
| 18. | Model keeping quiet could be a scornful person (7) | ||
| Spitter | Sitter (=model) around p(=quiet) | ||
| 19. | Need about 25 sheets of paper (7) | ||
| Require | Re + quire (unit of paper measurment) | ||
| 20. | Heart and soul evident in army officer’s utterance (6) | ||
| Kernel | Hom. of colonel | ||
| 23. | What cold home must reverse to become somewhere comfortable (5) | ||
| Niche | Eh(=what) + c +in, all rev. | ||
Thanks, Neal. Is Quixote ever controversial? Only when there’s a z in the month, I fancy.
As always, a solid and clearly-clued puzzle. I thought STEERING WHEEL was a clever anagram and I also liked the homophone in KERNEL.
I knew COATI, but POILU was a new one. It means ‘hairy’ in French, so why French WW1 soldiers were called that is a mystery. Perhaps they were considered to be hairy-arsed or something.
Thanks to the Don for the start to the Indy week.
This was a very enjoyable puzzle by Quixote. I liked so many of the clues, such as 1a, 14a, 11a, 24a, 6d, 27a, 7d, and 20d (last in).
New words for me were SUPEREROGATION, TWO-PHASE & POILU.
Thanks for the blog, NealH. I needed your help to parse 15d.
“so why French WW1 soldiers were called that is a mystery”
It’s from Napoleonic times.
Just before they mutinied in 1918 the poilus made baaing noises as they went over the top, since they were being led like lambs to the slaughter. In another life c’etait mon truc, ca.
I didn’t know, or couldn’t remember, SUPEREROGATION, but it was easy enough to deduce once a few checkers were in place. Even though KERNEL/colonel is something of a chestnut in crosswordland it was my last in and only became obvious once I had ETHEREAL.
The term ‘poilu’ may well date back to Napoleonic times, but it was most certainly still being used in WW1. I have heard the story of the poilus bleating in relation to more than one of the slaughters the French Army was involved in. The disastrous Nivelle Offensive along the Chemin des Dames, otherwise known as the Second Battle of the Aisne, is certainly one of them, but I have also read about the same thing happening at Verdun in 1916 when new battalions of cannon fodder were making their way along the Voie Sacree towards the battlefield and passed injured troops who were being withdrawn from the area. It was the Nivelle Offensive that led to the great French Army mutiny of 1917. Truly horrific times.
Nothing difficult or controversial in this offering from the Don. If anything a bit on the easy side – the long anagrams were all pretty obvious. TWO-PHASE was a little unusual – two-phase power supplies were used in the early 20th century but were phased out (sorry!) in favour of three-phase and are rarely found today. The technically minded can find the details at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Two-phase_electric_power
Thanks, Quixote and NealH
Correctly workedout (well ok, guessed) poilu but the rest fell pretty smoothly for nicely constructed, does exactly what we’d expect for a monday warm up.
Thanks NealH and Q who can hardly be described as 26a today.
Thanks Quixote and NealH. A good start to the week. It was late so we used electronic assistance for 21ac – can’t believe we didn’t get it from the word play but it was a new word for us.