Financial Times 16,963 by MONK

A tricky puzzle from Monk, but that will come as no great surprise to FT regulars. As always the struggle is very satisfying one. Thank you Monk.

I have no idea about the Nina, but that should come as no surprise either.

Thanks to Andrew for spotting HIGGLEDY-PIGGLEDY hiding in the grid.

ACROSS
7	OIL-CAKE	Muse over having exposed unlimited food for Highlands, say? (3-4)
		CLIO (one of the muses) reversed(over) with nAKEd (exposed) missing outer letters (unlimited) – food for Highland cattle perhaps
8	IRRUPT	Break in appeal holding back Queen’s Speech? (6)
		IT (appeal, eg sex appeal) contains PURR (the noise made by a cat, the speech of a queen) reversed (back)
10	BODEGA	Waited to the very end, closing a wine shop (6)
		BODE (waited, pp of bide) with last letter (to the very end) of closinG and A
11	PTOMAINE	A pimento hybrid that’s potentially toxic (8)
		anagram (hybrid) of A PIMENTO
12	AFFIRMER	I confirm if farmer needs a bit of a change (8)
		anagram (needs a bit of a change) of IF FARMER
13	ISAIAH	Profit reported in tax-free scheme – excellent returns by end of month (6)
		a double wordplay clue: ISA (tax-free savings scheme) then AI (A1, excellent) reversed (returns) and montH (end letter of) and ISAIAH is a prophet, sounds like (reported) profit
14	CHEER UP	Revolutionary modest backing brings comfort (5,2)
		CHE (Che Guevara, revolutionary) then PURE (modest, of a girl) reversed (backing)
16	YOBBOES	Unknown bishop blocking organ stops thugs (7)
		Y (an unknown) then B (bishop) inside (blocking) OBOES (organ stops)
19	APLOMB	Place order on Amazon’s first book? Cool (6)
		PL (place) OM (Order of Merit) following (on) Amazon(first letter of) then B (book)
21	NGULTRUM	Energy-free gluten crackers – strange Bhutanese bread? (8)
		anagram (crackers) of GLUTeN missing E (energy) then RUM (strange) – the currency of Bhutan, bread is slang for money
23	CEREMENT	Stiff cloth about to be coated with glue (8)
		RE (about) inside (to be coated with) CEMENT (glue) – a waxed cloth used to wrap a dead body (a stiff)
24	ALMOST	Very nearly skinned fish – good man (6)
		sALMOn (fish) missing outer letters (skinned) then ST (saint, a good man)
25	USEFUL	Competent spouse fully gives more than needed (6)
		found inside (some of, there are more letters than needed) spoUSE FULly
26	ADDENDA	Supplements potential online publicity blocker as discussed (7)
		sounds like (as discussed) of “ad ender” (possible online publicity blocker, an “ad blocker”)
DOWN
1	HOT OFF THE PRESS	New and sensational French art in fresh photo unexpectedly cut by this paper (3,3,3,5)
		ES (art, 2nd person of are in French, thou art) inside anagram (unexpectedly) of FRESH PHOTO containing (cut by) FT (this paper)
2	ALGERINE	Good old Ireland’s cracking beer getting past pirate (8)
		G (good) ERIN (Ireland, of old) inside (cracking) ALE (beer) – definition is pirate, past indicates historical use
3	NAPALM	Incendiary material in article about bribe (6)
		AN (indefinite article) reversed (about) then PALM (bribe)
4	LEOPARD	One’s spotted in dance outfit following a change of heart (7)
		LEOtARD (dance outfit) with middle letter (heart) changed (from T to P)
5	HIROHITO	Former leader of Ireland, old twat under house arrest? (8)
		IR (Ireland) O (old) HIT (twat, to strike viscously) all inside (under…arrest) HO (house) – former emperor of Japan
6	ARMADA	Boundless karma made man fleet (6)
		outer letters missing (boundless) form kARMa mADe mAn
9	PANCAKE TUESDAY	When an upward trend in battery production is likely to occur? (7,7)
		cryptic definition I think, but I can’t really explain exactly why. Perhaps a battery is a place where batter is cooked? Perhaps chickens on a battery farm (can they really lay more eggs just on one Tuesday of the year)? pancakes are made from batter so are battery productions (like batter) and they are traditionally tossed in the air while cooking (so display upward trends)
15	UMBRELLA	Unopened room in shadow offering protection (8)
		cELL (room, unopened) inside UMBRA (shadow)
17	BATEMENT	Reduction once meant bet should be dissolved (8)
		anagram (should be dissolved) of MEANT BET – once indicates an obsolete word
18	INSTEAD	This month, see Andy regularly appearing as a substitute (7)
		INST (this month) then every other letter (regularly appearing) of sEs AnDy
20	ONE-OFF	Put away after first solitary (3-3)
		OFF (put away, to kill for example) following ONE (number 1, the first) – or you also have After (first letter of)
22	UGANDA	Country in which solvers look to get caught (6)
		sounds like (to get caught) of “you gander” (solvers look)

11 comments on “Financial Times 16,963 by MONK”

In 9d I think the idea is that pancakes are made of batter, so they are batter-y productions.

We have HIGGLEDY PIGGLEDY running down diagonally from square 1 and the P of CHEER UP.

Thanks Andrew, you have 9d exactly.

Andrew@1` thanks-I’ll be in bed by the time Monk pops in-if he does
And thanks for the batter-y -that was intended to upset people
And thanks Monk and Pee Dee

Also the “upward trend” presumably refers to the tossing of pancakes (though it could be just an increase in their numbers).

Thanks again Andrew, 9d gets better and better!

Very tough. I marked nine clues as “H” for “hard”, with a trio of new words – OIL-CAKE, NGULTRUM and CEREMENT – and two unparsed in HIROHITO and PANCAKE TUESDAY to add to the mix. I ended up not getting ALGERINE and didn’t spot the Nina. Yet another example of one answer here (an uncommon word) appearing elsewhere today in a similar part of the grid.

Favourite was ISAIAH, definitely one I marked as “H”. Interesting to have the def as homophone + indicator, also seen elsewhere today.

Thanks to Monk and to PeeDee

Thanks Monk and PeeDee
Tough !!
Needed help throughout – word finder for CEREMENT, ALGERINE, HIROHITO and BATEMENT and a dictionary to look up the currency of Bhutan when I twigged to that sort of ‘bread’. Was happy that I thought that had parsed most of them, but needed correcting with the parsing of OIL CAKE (lazily thought that food was CAKE with no C, but that wouldn’t have really passed muster), didn’t understand where the FT came from in 1d and really didn’t go close with ONE OFF.
However was satisfied with getting the grid correctly filled and a majority, including the tricky IRRUPT, HIROHITO and ALGERINE parsed. Really enjoyed the homophonic definition for ISAIAH (after being able to piece together the answer from the wordplay)
Missed seeing the Nina, although I knew that there would be one.
Finally finished in the NW corner with the ALGERINE and OIL CAKE as the last couple in.

An extremely tough brain-mangler of a crossword – lots of things I hadn’t heard of which were gettable from the wordplay. Like WordPlodder I did notice a solution here appearing in the crossword I solved before this one – I did wonder whether Monk was the setter of that one too

thanks to Monk and PeeDee

Gave up with 6 unsolved, though I thoroughly enjoyed what I did and managed 3 nho (PTOMAINE, NGULTRUM and CEREMENT).
I think the definition in 14a should be just ‘comfort’; if you include ‘brings’ the solution would have to be ‘cheers up’.
Thanks both.

Sat in the dentist’s waiting room attempting this one but no light relief to be had from this beast of a grid! Like Sourdough, I landed PTOMAINE, NGULTRUM and CEREMENT as they were clearly parsed.
But HIROHITO was a complete failure while OIL CAKE (persisted with OAT) and ALGERINE were near-misses. I had to reel in PANCAKE TUESDAY to secure the ‘e’ of ‘yobboes’ which I’ve never seen this way. I did really like the two long down clues. What with PANCAKES and the nina, I’m reminded of that old nursery rhyme about the ‘brown hen who lays eggs for gentlemen’.

Thanks Sourdough, well spotted. Fixed now.

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