A tricky puzzle from Aardvark, and very enjoyable (for those who like a tussle).
I think this is a pangram, I havn’t performed and exhaustive check (because I’m exhausted) but most of the usual suspects are there. I think this would explain the presence of the obscure words. Aardvark does not make the clues any easier to compensate though!
Thanks Aardvark, a great puzzle.
| Across | ||
| 1 | QUICHE |
Pastry which French cook trimmed (6)
QUI (which, French) CHEf (cook, trimmed)
|
| 4 | BIARRITZ |
Boozer circulates no.1 hotel in European resort (8)
BAR (boozer) contains (circulates, goes round) I (No. 1) then RITZ (hotel)
|
| 10 | AU NATUREL |
Plain tuna’s sprinkled with bay leaf covering (not starter) (2,7)
TUNA* anagram=is sprinkled inside lAUREL (bay leaf covering, a wreath) missing starting letter
|
| 11 | CREED |
Articles available from language department (5)
CREE (language) D (department) – the articles of faith
|
| 12 | ROAN |
Trio gains, regularly picking out horse? (4)
tRiO gAiNs (regularly picking out, every other letter)
|
| 13 | PETRONELLA |
Fuel sustains Tyneside lads, half dancing this? (10)
PETROL (fuel) contains (holds, sustains) NE (NE England, Tyneside) LAds (half of) – a Scottish country dance
|
| 15 | IRKSOME |
It’s annoying when church defaced roughly? (7)
kIRK (church, defaced=no front) SOME (roughly)
|
| 16 | APERCU |
Glimpse child’s head during game with mirror (6)
C (head, first letter, of child) in (during) RU (Rugby Union, game) following APE (mirror, copy)
|
| 19 | ANGSTY |
Concerned, Alan gets turkey gutted thoroughly (6)
AlaN GetS TurkeY (gutted thoroughly, no inside letters throughout)
|
| 21 | ROSEATE |
Pink eggs collected back in woods to consume (7)
ROE (eggs) contain (collected) woodS (last letter, back in) EAT (to consume)
|
| 23 | EASTBOURNE |
Coastal town boats, foolishly open to all, besieged by seabird (10)
BOATS* anagram=foolishly U (open to all, cinema) inside (besieged by) ERNE (the sea eagle, seabird)
|
| 25 | CLOD |
Jerk line amid fish (4)
L (line) in (amid) COD (fish) – an idiot
|
| 27 | INFER |
Current judge retired to make conclusion (5)
IN (current, trendy) REF (judge) reversed (retired)
|
| 28 | UNWRITTEN |
Traditional nutrient somehow arrests onset of wind (9)
NUTRIENT* anagram=somehow contains (arrests) Wind (first letter of)
|
| 29 | MORAY EEL |
Swimmer from Glasgow always put in extra length (5,3)
AYE (always, Scots, from Glasgow) put inside MORE (extra)
|
| 30 | LEXEME |
Linguistics unit, ie lecturer and author, hold English course (6)
L (lecturer) and ME (the author) contain (hold) EXE (a river, course, in England) – the minimal component of a set of related words
|
| Down | ||
| 1 | QUATRAIN |
Daughter bypasses courtyard to teach some poetry (8)
QUAd (courtyard) missing (bypassed by) D (daughter) to TRAIN (teach)
|
| 2 | IAN RANKIN |
Writer’s first article published is on family (3,6)
I (first) AN (article) RAN (pubished) on KIN (family)
|
| 3 | HATE |
Have no stomach for fifth pork-pie? (4)
HAT E (the fith hat) – a pork-pie hat perhaps
|
| 5 | ILLYRIA |
Dicky rejected spacious European area of old (7)
ILL (dicky) AIRY (spacious) reversed (rejected) – a area of the Adriatic once populated by an ancient Indo-European pople
|
| 6 | RACONTEUSE |
She relates habit by motorists adopting improper tone (10)
USE (habit) following (by) RAC (motorists) all containing (adopting) TONE* anagram=improper
|
| 7 | ILEAL |
The Italian accepts meadow’s connected to part of canal (5)
IL (the, Italian) contains (accepts) LEA (meadow) – part of the small intestine (a canal, biologically)
|
| 8 | ZODIAC |
Stars here backed rally round in business zone (6)
AID (rally round) in CO (business) Z (zone) all reversed (backed)
|
| 9 | GRAEME |
Scot perhaps who paints disturbing masterpiece close to home (6)
RA (Royal Academician, someone who paints) inside (disturbing) GEM (masterpiece) with homE (close to, last letter of) – an common Scottish name
|
| 14 | GOOSEBERRY |
One watches pair getting fruity pie full of this? (10)
double/cryptic definition
|
| 17 | CHARLOTTE |
Cleaner loads the empty dessert dish (9)
CHAR (cleaner) LOT (loads) ThE (empty, no middle letters)
|
| 18 | TEA DANCE |
Social occasion seen in Assam and Charleston? (3,5)
TES (Assam) and DANCE (charleston) – the question mark indicates examples of teas and dances
|
| 20 | YOUTUBE |
Second person raising electronic objection somewhere on the web (7)
YOU (second person) then E (electronic) BUT (an objection) reversed (raised)
|
| 21 | RENOWN |
Tiny bird initially ignored private celebrity (6)
wREN (tiny bird, initially ignored) OWN (private)
|
| 22 | HELIUM |
He gets a buzz touring French island northwards (6)
HUM (a buzz) contains (touring) ILE (island, French) reversed (northwards) – the chemical symbol, a cleverly disguised definition!
|
| 24 | SAFER |
Less risky when putting back iron right? (5)
AS (when) reversed (putting back) FE (iron) R (right)
|
| 26 | JIVE |
Steps lead to jet setter’s (4)
Jet (lead to, first letter of) I’VE (the setter has) – a dance
|
*anagram
definitions are underlined
definitions are underlined
Definitely a challenge! 9d defeated me – I became obsessed with obscure taxes…
Thanks Aardvark and PeeDee for clarity
Me too, peterj! I thought of GRAEME but could not make sense of it. Many thanks to PeeDee and Aardvark.
Terrific puzzle, and essential blog. I confess I didn’t finish. Thanks, both, for a sterling job.
Thanks Aardvark and PeeDee
In 29ac, I took the “always” to be AYE and the “length” to be just L, but it works either way.
Pelham, you are correct in your interpretation. I checked the dictionary and the spelling for the unit of length is ELL, not EL. ELL does have an alternative spelling EL in other usages, which is what must have confused me.
Thanks PD got all but lexeme, the checking letters aren’t a great deal of help. But otherwise a great mental workout. Guessed it was going to be a pangram getting the 1s early on.
Aardvark has stretched us to the limit yet again.
I wasn’t completely happy with 16A – ‘game with mirror’ has to be read as ‘mirror with game’.
Many thanks to PeeDee
Marvellous puzzle.
Failed on 9d, though, but that’s not a shame.
And when, at least for me, it outshone today’s Nutmeg, well, there must be something very right about this Aardvark.
(I am sure Blackadder doesn’t agree …. 🙂 )
Thanks Aardvark and PeeDee
Well, this one was one and truly tattered by the time that GRAEME was finally written in with no real confidence and no parsing except for the final E. Think that it was extremely tough to have a name not necessarily limited to Scotland (as definition) with a difficult cryptic construction to ‘help’ work it out – still technically it was perfectly legitimate.
This was a seriously hard puzzle that I looked at on and off for the duration, with little headway on this last clue until finally taking the punt on a 1/6th parsing of the guessed answer.
Made a similar parsing error as PeeDee with MORAY EEL.
Nice to get this one finally finished … and see that I have another of his from June 3 that I should get on to now !!