Thank you to Bluth. Definitions are underlined in the clues.
Across
1. Prepares last portions of chips and fish with mushy peas (6)
SHAPES : Last letters, respectively, of(last portions of) [“chips” and “fish“] plus(with) anagram of(mushy) PEAS.
Defn: In sports to …./to set oneself up to perform a particular action, eg. in football, to take a free kick.
5. Help politician to conceal British tale of woe (3,5)
SOB STORY : [SOS(Help!/an urgent appeal for help) + TORY(short for a politician from the Conservative Party)] containing(to conceal) B(abbrev. for “British”).
9. Maybe pancake with essentially watery filling is uninspired (4-6)
FLAT-FOOTED : [FLAT FOOD](how one might describe/maybe a pancake) containing(with … filling) middle 2 letters of(essentially) “watery“.
10. Teacher’s anguish (4)
ACHE : Hidden in(…’s) “Teacher“.
11. Book again – including a little champagne flute (8)
RECORDER : RE-ORDER(to book/order again) containing(including) 1st letter of(a little) “champagne“.
Defn: A musical instrument, not the glass.
12. Win gold for coach (6)
LANDAU : LAND(to win/to attain) AU(symbol for the chemical element, gold).
13. Consume sport (4)
WEAR : Double defn: 1st: To eat away/to corrode/to slowly consume; and 2nd: To don/to display.
15. Cassette re-established legal precedent (4,4)
TEST CASE : Anagram of(… re-established) CASSETTE.
18. Good nutrient halved in Dr Pepper (8)
PIMIENTO : PI(short for “pious”/religious/good) + [last 4 letters of(… halved) “nutrient” contained in(in) MO(abbrev. for “medical officer”/a doctor in the military)].
19. Regularly ignored fungal yeast’s beginning to be unsightly (4)
UGLY : 1st, 3rd and 5th letters of(Regularly) deleted from(ignored) “fungal” + 1st letter of(…’s beginning) “yeast“.
21. Young horse scratching a short tail (6)
FOLLOW : “foal”(a young horse) minus(scratching) “a” + LOW(short, as opposed to “tall”).
23. Friend might – in extremis – greet naked dates found here? (4,4)
PALM TREE : PAL(a friend/mate) + 1st and last letters of(… – in extremis) “might” + 1st and last letters deleted from(… naked) “greet“.
25. Almost destroy new oven (4)
KILN : “kill”(to destroy/to eliminate with extreme prejudice) minus its last letter(Almost …) + N(abbrev. for “new”).
26. Snooty one in popular comedy ultimately putting sex appeal into play … (5-5)
HOITY-TOITY : I(Roman numeral for “one”) contained in(in) HOT(popular/the current rage) + last letter of(… ultimately) “comedy” + [IT(sex appeal, as in “the it girls”) contained in(putting … into) TOY(to play with)].
27. … short play, good in points and theatre’s booming (8)
PLANGENT : “play” minus its last letter(short …) + G(abbrev. for “good”) contained in(in) N,E(abbrev. for “north” and “east”/two compass point) plus(and) NT(abbrev. for the National Theatre).
28. Liberal Party Housing Spokesperson finally makes room (6)
PANTRY : Anagram of(Liberal) PARTY containing(Housing) last letter of(… finally) “Spokesperson“.
Down
2. Lethal venom bottles split into two (5)
HALVE : Hidden in(… bottles) “Lethal venom“.
3. Spray, tip or pour mixture (9)
POTPOURRI : Anagram of(Spray) TIP OR POUR.
4. Tatty, blingy daughters take wife’s place (6)
SHODDY : “showy”(blingy/flashy) with D,D(2 x abbrev. of “daughter’) replacing(take …’s place) “w”(abbrev. for “wife”).
5. Settled wee kitty moving in and there’s no room for any more at this juncture (10,5)
SATURATION POINT : SAT(settled/seated on) + [URINATION(wee/act of peeing) + POT(kitty/pool of money in a gambling game like poker) with “in” moving from the former word into the latter].
6. Be grateful for entertaining cricket game – it’s unreal (8)
BODILESS : BLESS(be grateful for/to thank as in “you should bless your good fortune”) containing(entertaining) ODI(abbrev. for One Day International, a cricket game with limited overs between teams with international status, played within a day).
7. Can touring artist work out (5)
TRAIN : TIN(a metal can) containing(touring) RA(abbrev. for “Royal Academician”, a member of the Royal Academy of the Arts, an artist).
8. Reading magazine nurse leaves after cycling here (9)
REHEARSAL : “arsenal”(a magazine/a store for weapons, ammunition and explosives) minus(… leaves) “EN”(abbrev. for “enrolled nurse”, in the UK) placed after(after) HERE with “RE” moving to the front(cycling …).
Defn: …/an interpretation/a performance, before the final one.
14. Leader let independent radio broadcast (9)
EDITORIAL : Anagram of(… broadcast) [LET + I(abbrev. for “independent”) + RADIO].
Defn: …, in a newspaper, say.
16. Judge on wretched TV show (9)
COUNTDOWN : COUNT(to judge/to consider, as in “count yourself lucky”) placed above(on, in a down clue) DOWN(wretched/in an unhappy or unfortunate state, as in “I felt wretched after my second jab.”).
…,, a blowfly that is.
17. Scatters seeds containing nitrogen with garden implement – it spreads the load on soft ground (8)
SNOWSHOE : SOWS(scatters seeds for growing, including metaphorically, wild oats) containing(containing) N(symbol for the chemical element, nitrogen) plus(with) HOE(garden implement, which could be used for sowing).
Defn: …, so that you don’t sink, not quite into the ground, but into the soft snow covering it.
20. Emphasise trouble (4,2)
PLAY UP : Double defn: 1st: To exaggerate/to inflate something’s significance; and 2nd: To cause pain, hurt or just to be naughty, as with children.
22. Crease navy sheets (5)
LINEN : LINE(a crease/a wrinkle) + N(abbrev. for “navy”).
Defn: … made, or originally made, of linen.
24. Join stuck-up priest in bed every now and then (5)
ENTER : Alternative letters(… every now and then) in reversal of(stuck-up, in a down clue) “priest in bed“.
Defn: …/to participate in, a competition, say.
Good fun. Particularly liked the wordplay in 5d and the biblical surface of 17d.
Minor correction to blog. In 9a, need the middle two letters of “watery”.
In 21a, I took “low” as short/low in provisions, for example.
My only minor criticism is that the anagram in 3d has POUR unaltered.
9a corrected.
A bit of a mixed bag for me with some enjoyable clues. There were a few odd surfaces, as seems to be the norm with this setter.
I didn’t realise before that a recorder was a type of flute.
Surely “wee” is either “urine (noun)” or “urinate (verb)” but not “urination”?
Thanks to Bluth and to scchua.
Thanks for the blog scchua.
Rabbit Dave @3 um… urination is a noun.
No theme or gimmicks today. Just a nice straightforward clever puzzle with a bunch of enjoyable mechanisms and plenty of humour as we’ve come to expect from Bluth. Like RD, I hadn’t realised the recorder/flute alternative. SATURATION POINT leapt out as a solution so I never spotted the clever construction I’m afraid.
BODILESS for the insertion of ODI (and which held out til last), SNOWSHOE and COUNTDOWN for the surface (and scchua’s illustration), SHODDY for the substitution, HOITY TOITY which, for some reason, made me think of Kenneth Williams, PIMIENTO for the Dr Pepper misdirection all earned ticks. SHAPES is nearly brilliant: personally, I think, if Bluth had moved an indication of mushiness to the end so it embraced all the anagram fodder, “fish and chips” could have been rendered in its usual order. Eg: Prepares last portions of fish and chips and peas properly mushed (6). As it was, the unusual juxtaposition led me to the solution. But that’s not a gripe. Lovely Sunday morning.
Thanks Bluth and scchua
Bluth @4. Obviously “urination” is a noun. My point is that it is not synonymous with “wee”, which can be either a noun meaning “urine” or a verb meaning “urinate”. “Urination” means “weeing”.
It’s all water under the bridge anyway…
RD @6. Let’s not belabour the point but if you say “I’m off for a quick wee” then “wee” seems to equate to “urination” in my book (possibly a bad choice of phrase).
Rabbit Dave @6
Chambers.
Wee (noun)
1. the act of urinating
2. urine
I really wasn’t expecting to spend any part of Sunday going over this!
6D BODILESS was my LOI as I couldn’t see ‘bless’ as ‘be grateful for’ (though quite rightly so) and though not a cricket fan it clicked eventually. Thanks Bluth for the fine puzzle and Sschua for the entertaining blog.
PostMark @5 I agree, of course, that chips and fish is a little unsatisfying… it’s a judgement call of course, but for me, I preferred leaving the phrase ‘mushy peas’ alone and would find ‘peas mushed up’ more unsatisfying.
Oh… also… Rabbit Dave – as you’re aware from previous discussions, I do find it a bit frustrating/odd when you say “some odd surfaces” but don’t say which ones seem odd or why…
Thank you to Bluth for another enjoyably entertaining crossword. Thanks also to scchua for the blog
Really enjoyed this, so thanks to Bluth. Saturation point was very clever, among many others. I love the word plangent, and how nice that there was no mention of a chap in that very good surface. Thanks to scchua for the entertaining blog. Couldn’t see wear=consume, and had no idea what ODI might signify.
For the first time ever (hailstorms here) I decided to do a crossword in one sitting and time myself, so now I have a benchmark. Hmm.
FLAT-FOOTED (in fact ,’flat-topped’, so two errors) by SATURATION POINT so didn’t have the satisfaction of a well-earned solve. Difficult parsing of others such as REHEARSAL made this quite a challenge, as expected from Bluth.
Favourite was RECORDER because it made me look up Chambers to confirm it could indeed be regarded as a ‘flute’. There I came across the word ‘fipple’, new to me and which will be hard to beat for word of the week.
Thanks to Bluth and scchua
A lot of fun here. Similarly to Bluth’s last appearance here I started really well, then found myself having to work harder until I kicked myself when I realised what the definition or parsing was (or gave up and hit reveal!)
13A, 18A, 23A and 6D and 8D all favourites when I cracked them.
Re the ordering of 1A, Radio Humberside has a weekly treasure hunt programme (all done from the studio at the moment) and in a recent episode a clue led to a Grimsby fish and chip shop called Chips and Fish, so it’s not entirely unknown (even if it’s only to appear higher up alphabetical listings!)
A fun puzzle, with the “moving in” trick the standout for me. 1A is a good idea: it’s a shame about the word order (which made it rather easier than it otherwise might have been). I wonder how many people on seeing the word “shape” would think of fish and chips?
I liked SHAPES especially as a relatively easy clue at 1 across encourages you into the puzzle. I needed the blog to parse SATURATION POINT and REHEARSAL. I thought SNOWSHOE was good, too. Thanks to Bluth and scchua
Good fun, thank you Bluth. Challenging but nothing ungettable.
I see both sides of the mushy peas argument: would “Prepares mushy peas with last portions of fish and chips” satisfy the judges?
I know we’re a day behind so not expecting a response, but can anyone explain why ‘S indicates the word is hidden in the previous word – 9A , am sure is this is standard but I don’t get it !
Thanks Bluth – lots we got, a few we didn’t but all good fun (RECORDER and SNOWSHOE our faves) thanks to scchua for the explanations!