Independent 9,022 by Crosophile

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A cheeky little number from Crosophile today…

Or rather saucy, lots of sauces or similar in the grid. Good fun but some unusual clue formations, suspect 17d 14d might provoke some Pierre like grumpiness.

 

Thanks Crosophile.

Across

1 Fruit and nut almost halved deficiency disease reportedly (9)
CRANBERRY

CRAN(k) – most of nut – & sounds like half of BERI(-beri)

6 Oddly statue by church is brass (5)
SAUCE

Odd letters of S(t)A(t)U(e) & C.E.

9 Proactive after scrapping first part of play in show (5)
PROVE

ACT 1 (first part of play) removed (scrapped) from PRO(acti)VE

10 A sort of trance in ecstasy – this is peachy! (9)
NECTARINE

TRANCE* sorted & IN & E(cstasy)

11 What’s left of uniform kept in lodge (7)
RESIDUE

U(niform) in RESIDE. I couldn’t find U=Uniform though but no doubt it’s in one of Crosophile’s dictionaries somewhere.

12 Fish creating havoc? Yes/No (7)
ANCHOVY

creating [HAVOC Y N]* Can’t stand the things myself.

13 Outdoor food from pub – because all traces of 24 6Ac gone (8)
BARBECUE

BAR (pub) & traces of A(pple) (24) S(auce) (6a) removed from BEC(a)U(s)E. Apple sauce with a barbecue? Blasphemy. Hog roast is another matter

15 Without any fat to shed (4-2)
LEAN-TO

LEAN (no fat) & TO, nice misleading surface though

17 Note structure’s snapped off in accident (6)
MISHAP

MI (note) & SHAP(e)

19 How one thing leads to another! – (if it gave us a turn it would be incidentally) (8)
CAUSALLY

Reversing US gives CASUALLY

22 Poison – it’s found in an ice cream (7)
ACONITE

IT inserted into A CONE. Apparently the homeopaths think this is one of their greatest medicines! How do you really deconstruct the arguments for homeopathy? Keep watering down your points until you don’t have any.

23 Pound each way put on gee-gee? Half that according to rule book (7)
GRAMMAR

RAM (to pound) & MAR (again reversed – the other way) after half of GG

26 All but leader in retrospect shot – highly hush-hush (3-6)
TOP-SECRET

[(r)ETROSPECT]* shot. Is this another Daily Mail anti Corbyn shot? 🙂

27 Worker follows power line in factory (5)
PLANT

P(ower) & L(ine) & ANT

28 Perhaps a takeaway by the dog tracks? (5)
CURRY

CUR (dog) & RY (railway)

29 Go by boat back to secret ground in City (9)
WORCESTER

ROW reversed & SECRET* ground

Down

1 What Batman wears to run and leap about (5)
CAPER

The CAPE(d crusader) & R(un)

2 Noisy reveller initially not caught – he’s waking people up (7)
AROUSER

C(aught) removed from (c)AROUSER

3 Money from short book, second hand? (5)
BREAD

B(ook) & READ (as most second hand books are)

4 He’s not the first with a couple of bits of rude news to upset virgin (6-2)
RUNNER-UP

First 2 letters of RU(de) Ne(ws) & PURE (virgin) reversed, interesting surface…

5 Lots of yuck followed by short police enquiry into Spanish daggers (6)
YUCCAS

YUC(k) & CAS(e). The plant yucca gloriosa is also known as Spanish Daggers

6 Maybe rustling gang sets ranch in a spin (9)
SNATCHERS

[SETS RANCH]* spinning

7 Tunic ornament bears heraldic beast (7)
UNICORN

Hidden answer but nicely done

8 All who might deserve favours if good when embracing daughter? (9)
EVERYBODY

The nmemonic for the musical stave EGBDF – Every Good Boy Deserves Favour so this is D(aughter) in EVERY BOY

13 Blown up explosive device when sound of timer’s stopped? (9)
BOMBASTIC

BOMB & AS (when) & a shortened TIC(K)

14 Like an eel, one cooked with Viv, say? (9)
EVASIVELY

Dodgy construction time indicated by the ? ONE indicating EEL so it’s [EEL VIV SAY]* cooked

16 Mafioso‘s unease when in Germany (8)
GANGSTER

ANGST in GER

18 Cork perhaps from sun hat (7)

STOPPER

S(un) & TOPPER (hat)

20 Source of wool when originally treated for carpet (7)
LAMBAST

LAMB (source of wool) & AS (when) & T(reated) originally

21 Where opening of bible is translated – from this? (6)

HEBREW

[WHERE B(ible)]* translated. This type of clue is a pain to identify the definition clearly.

24 Program is axed for IT company (5)
APPLE

APPLE(t) with the end axed, chopped off

25 Turner‘s rubbish, getting nothing right (5)

ROTOR

ROT & 0 & R

11 comments on “Independent 9,022 by Crosophile”

  1. Saucy but nice Monday-morning difficulty.

    I think you might mean 17a as there isn’t a 17d! It didn’t make me grumpy.

    Thanks to Crosophile and Flashling.

  3. Re 11a, u= uniform in the NATO phonetic alphabet.
    Thanks, Flashling, and Crosophile for a gentle, but entertaining puzzle.

  4. How did I miss such an obvious theme? But the non-thematic EVERYBODY was my CoD. Thanks, Crosophile and Flashling.

    Btw the puzzle’s not accessible on Crossword Solver again. Does anyone know why? It was OK yesterday and I can load old puzzles on it so the problem’s not at my end.

  6. I did spend a while trying to make an anagram out of one, Viv and say for 14D, so it could be said that it’s a little misleading. The similarity of Apple and applet had escaped me until now – I imagine some people must think they are named after the company, but of course it’s just short for app(lication)-let.

  7. Thanks for the blog, Flashling, and the link to the rather fine highlighted diagram. I guess ‘nectarine sauce’ isn’t yet sufficiently mainstream, and ‘aconite sauce’ even less so. 😀
    By the way, 14d was deliberately a bit sneaky – but hopefully all the nicer when you spot the subterfuge? Hope so, anyway.

  8. 4 dn, “NE” for a couple of bits of news doesn’t work, it has to be “NN”, which sort of spoils the surface.

  9. @#8 You’re sort of right, h.eckler, except it’s not ‘a couple of bits of news’ that yields NN but simply ‘news’ in the sense of ‘more than one ‘new’, ie N+N. Hope that makes sense.

  10. Thanks CP thought nectarine and top secret might be sauces, sure I’ve heard that somewhere and hoped others might find some I’d missed. A couple of news could be nn or ne or whatever the devious swine setting thinks it means. 🙂

  11. Thanks, Crosophile, for the clarification; the blog, though, has couple of bits of news as NE, hence the confusion.

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