I would describe this as traditional in style without feeling old-fashioned. Not that easy either, plenty to get your teeth into if you like to parse everything fully. Thank you Aardvark.
The grid is one Z short of a double pangram.
ACROSS | ||
1 | INK-CAP |
Latest group of cubs brought back fungus (3-3)
|
IN (latest, fashionable) then PACK (group of cubs) reversed (brought back) | ||
5 | MANPOWER |
Force of soldiers, number unknown, encapsulated by sad war poem (8)
|
N (an unknown number) inside (encapsulated by) anagram (sad) of WAR POEM | ||
9 | QUIRKILY |
Oddly unrestrained, squire clipped garment of Scot and Yankee (8)
|
sQUIRe (unrestrained, not outer letters) then KILt (garment of Scot, clipped) and Y (Yankee, phonetic alphabet again) | ||
10 | HAGGIS |
Ogress’s hosting private course in Edinburgh? (6)
|
HAG’S (ogress is) contains (hosting) GI (a US soldier, a private in rank perhaps) | ||
11 | GAELIC |
European replaces first line in French language (6)
|
GALLIC (French) with E (European) replacing the first letter L (line) | ||
12 | AQUANAUT |
Underwater explorer cooked tuna on a wharf briefly (8)
|
anagram (cooked) of A TUNA follows (on) A QUAy (wharf, briefly) | ||
14 | EXPERIMENTAL |
Specialist detailed one ridiculous trial (12)
|
EXPERt (specialist) missing last letter (de-tailed) then I (one) and MENTAL (ridiculous) | ||
18 | ARTFUL DODGER |
Fabled thief’s paintings reportedly filled vehicle of US Republican (6,6)
|
ART (paintings) then FUL sounds like (reportedly) “full” (filled) DODGE (make of vehicle in US) and R (republican) | ||
22 | INEDIBLE |
Hard to believe declining councillor’s not suitable for corporation? (8)
|
INcrEDIBLE (haed to believe) missing (declining) CR (Cr, councillor) – not suitable for putting in your belly (corporation, middle-aged spread) | ||
25 | EJECTA |
Stuff thrown out, disheartening Jane, collected by city volunteers (6)
|
JanE (no middle letters, dis-heartened) inside (collected by) EC (The City, financial district of London, from postal code) and TA (former Territorial Army, volunteer soldiers) | ||
26 | TARIFF |
Jack provided following list of prices (6)
|
TAR (Jack, a sailor) F (following) and IF (provided) | ||
27 | SPICE BOX |
Basil and others are kept in this cubicle on special reserve (5,3)
|
BOX (cubicle) following (on) SP (special) ICE (reserve, restrained manner) | ||
28 | HEDGEROW |
Husband having advantage quarrelling? It’s thorny stuff (8)
|
H (husband) with EDGE (advantage) then ROW (quarrelling) | ||
29 | ERSATZ |
Synthetic debris regularly seen at mouth of Zambesi (6)
|
every other letter (regularly seen ) of dEbRiS then AT with Zambesi (first letter, mouth of). I suppose the mouth is actually the end of a river, not its starting point. Not a criticism of the clue which works fine, but just a passing thought. | ||
DOWN | ||
2 | NOUGAT |
Sweetie united during raunchy Tango (6)
|
U (united) inside anagram (raunchy) of TANGO | ||
3 | CORAL REEF |
Wow! Gangster free after fiddling offshore bank system? (5,4)
|
COR (wow!) AL (Al Capone, gangster) then anagram (after fiddling) of FREE | ||
4 | PRINCIPAL |
Pair in element about promoted film’s leading actor? (9)
|
PR (pair) IN with AL (Aluminium, an element) contains (about) PIC (film) reversed (promoted) | ||
5 | MAYFAIR |
London area’s springtime exhibition (7)
|
MAY (springtime) and FAIR (exhibition) | ||
6 | NEHRU |
Personnel intercepting new German leader in Asia once (5)
|
HR (Human Resources, personnel) inside (intercepting) NEU (new, in German) – Jawaharlal Nehru, independence leader and India’s first Prime Minister | ||
7 | ORGAN |
Banana grower partly boosted skin maybe (5)
|
found inside (partly) banaNA GROwer reversed (boosted, sent upward in a down solution) | ||
8 | EPIDURAL |
Recording personal details, Laura shortly arranged anaesthetic (8)
|
EP (extended play, gramophone recording) ID (personal details) then anagram (arranged) of LAURa (shortened) | ||
13 | ATE |
Dined at first in eatery (3)
|
AT then Eatery (first letter of) | ||
15 | MAGNETISE |
Make attractive journal on Web that is engaging society (9)
|
MAG (magazine, journal) on NET (the Web) then IE (that is) containing (engaging) S (society) | ||
16 | NERVELESS |
Slack lever twisted entering headland (9)
|
anagram (twisted) inside NESS (headland) – a usage of slack/nerveless that I have not seen before, listed in Chambers | ||
17 | TRUNCATE |
Shorten ladder Charlie put in gallery (8)
|
RUN (ladder in stocking) C (Charlie, letter in phonetic alphabet) all inside TATE (gallery) | ||
19 | UNI |
Place to read a Corsican newspaper (3)
|
UN (a, in French, in Corsica perhaps) then I (the i, name of a UK newspaper) – one reads (studies) a subject at university | ||
20 | OVERSAW |
Managed six deliveries with son per week (7)
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OVER (six deliveries in cricket) with S (son) A (per, eg an apple a day…) and W (week) | ||
21 | AT MOST |
Cash machine supported by cockney entertainer Max (2,4)
|
ATM (cash machine) before (on top of, supported by in a down solution) ‘OST (host, entertainer, as said in cockney) | ||
23 | DJING |
Spinning daughter initially nauseous in folk dance (5)
|
D (daughter) Nauseous (first letter, initially) inside JIG (folk dance) – being a DJ (disc jockey), spinning records. I didn’t seriously expect this to be a word, at least not un-hyphenated, but it is listed in Chambers. | ||
24 | BY FAR |
British and Yankee airmen travelling skywards easily (2,3)
|
B (British) and Y (Yankee, phonetic alphabet) then RAF (airmen) reversed (travelling skywards, upward in a down solution) |
Thanks for the blog , a lot of intricate word play today. ( TUNA has acquired a superfluous A )
I was surprised by PRIVATE= GI but what you say makes perfect sense , just used to seeing soldier I suppose.
DJING was also a bit of a shock but quite valid you say, I was thinking of spirits.
NEU = NEW was also something I have not seen but the clue was easy for that one.
The blog has saved me a lot of extra checking today.
Took some effort to finally get the parsing all sorted out. I initially couldn’t see DJING, which I thought might be a word of non-English origin, until the penny dropped. INKCAP, the only unknown, was helpfully clued. I spent ages at the end on my last in, the not very difficult MANPOWER.
The ‘Fabled thief’ was my favourite clue. Bit of a pity about the “missed by that much” double pangram. I wondered if the clue for MAGNETISE could have been slightly modified, together with an indication that the American (or Oxford) spelling was required, to provide that pesky extra Z.
Thanks to Aardvark and to PeeDee for the usual helpful blog.
I had never heard of DJ as a verb (nor its participle DJING) before, either.
FWIW, in the US, GI usually stands for “Government Issue”, originally describing the equipment issued to soldiers. It can refer to enlisted personnel in the Army of any rank, including privates.
Thanks for that EdK. For years I have been mistakenly thinking GI stood for General Infantry. I can’t remember where I read that, it would have been pre-Internet, but it appears to be wrong.
The blog is updated now.
ACD
Thanks to Aardvark and Peedee. I’m another who had trouble with DJING and also with the CR taken from INEDIBLE and struggled with INK-CAP and my LOI QUIRKILY.
Thanks to setter and blogger. I didn’t get djing though I think I should have now I see Peedee’s explanation. I reluctantly entered spice box – surely basil is a herb not a spice?
Sourdough @6 – while writing the blog I wondered if Basil can count a a spice too. I checked Chambers and it defines spice Any aromatic and pungent vegetable substance used as a condiment and for seasoning food, eg pepper, cayenne pepper, pimento, nutmeg, mace, vanilla, ginger, cinamon, cassia etc
So it doesn’t list any Basil-like substances, but then it doesn’t specifically exclude Basil (clearly a vegetable substance and arguably both pungent and aromatic) either. I spent far too long thinking about this and in the end I decided to just move on and get the blog published instead 🙂
PeeDee @ 7 & Sourdough @ 6
I wondered at that too, and my take is also that basil isn’t a spice.
Notwithstanding PeeDee’s comment, and I maybe setting myself up to be shot down here, I think that herbs are predominantly leaves (viz the derivation of the word) whereas spices tend to be roots, seeds or ground vegetables. I think too that most herbs can be used fresh, while that’s not generally the case with spices.
Another not very happy with basil as a spice nor the ugly DJING, but otherwise a good workout, with QUIRKILY and ARTFUL DODGER as favourites.
Hi Simon, personally I don’t think of Basil as a spice either, but when writing the blog I try to go by what the dictionary says rather than what I think personally. My other consideration was wondering if a spice box had to contain only spices, or if it could contain flavouring ingredients in general, like the way a sewing box might contain various items not specifically used for sewing. Like I said, I spent far too long thinking about this.
Thanks Aardvark, that was satisfying. There were many clues that I ticked including ARTFUL DODGER, INEDIBLE, HEDGEROW (great surface), TRUNCATE, and DJING. Failed with INK-CAP and NERVELESS, both new to me. Thanks PeeDee for the blog and the herb/spice discussion.
Thanks Aardvark and PeeDee. I have been out all day so this is my first chance to comment. When I solved the puzzle this morning, I spotted the pangram but did not see how close it was to a double pangram. On reading PeeDee’s introduction, I had a similar thought to WordPlodder @2. I wonder if Aardvark was required to change the answer at 15dn to the current standard UK spelling. My understanding is that Z spellings were standard in the UK until at least the 1960s, but S spellings had become standard by the turn of the century.
It wasn’t very good, was it?
Furhter to comment 12, Aardvark could also have completed the double pangram by putting UZI (defined in Chambers 2014 as an Israeli submachine-gun) instead of UNI at 19dn. That makes me inclined to think that Aardvark submitted a puzzle with a double pangram, and that a crossword editor may have taken one of the Zs out (either or both of 15dn and 19dn) and changed the clue without necessarily realising what he was doing, and without consulting Aardvark. Is that possible behaviour for the FT crossword editor?
According to BBC America, either s or z is acceptable in the UK and most of the rest of the English-speaking world — except for the US:
https://www.bbcamerica.com/anglophenia/2014/07/brits-spell-realize-s
I wonder what Pelham @12 meant by “standardised”. Perhaps it means “most commonly used” in which case S may well be overtaking Z in the popularity stakes outside the US. In the sense of “following the rules”, I don’t think there is any official body that governs the use of English. Modern dictionaries are an evolving catalogue of the English language as it is used rather than a prescriptive set of words that define it. Individual bodies, such as the FT may well have their own style guide that prescribes the use of language within their own organization. I would expect the FT to have quite a strict one, particularly as it has an international readership. Some involvement by the editor seems quite a likely possibility.
PS EdK – when I try to follow the link @15 I get – 404 page not found.
PeeDee @16: In comment 12, I said “standard” rather than “standardised”, and definitely meant this in the sense of “most commonly used”,(as I understand from my own observation). There is indeed an FT style guide, but you have to buy it on Amazon. I got the same 404 response when trying to follow Ed’s link. Perhaps the page is set to be accessible only from the USA – or only outside the UK.
I had the same suspicion as Pelham @17 about accessibility of the site; the link works fine on my phone here in the US.
I found it by Google search.
Thanks Aardvark and PeeDee
Only got to this one in the early hours of Friday our time. Was able to fill the grid in about normal time, but as others have said, there was a lot of complex parsing to negotiate to finish it out.
I hadn’t heard of the term SPICE BOX as such and that gave more of a head scratch than to whether basil could be classified as a spice – I assumed that it was the dried leaves that were so classified rather than the fresh version – but admit ignorance in the hard definitions of the two.
Enjoyed working through the complexities of the parsing, finishing in the NW corner with GAELIC, CORAL REEF (tricky definition as an ‘offshore bank system’) and INK CAP (totally worked out from the word play and checking afterwards).