Thank you to Bobcat. Definitions are underlined in the clues.
Across
1. Military Intelligence backed sanctions ending early deadlock (7)
IMPASSE : Reversal of(… backed) MI(abbrev. for “Military Intelligence”, as in “MI5”) + “passes”(sanctions/approves) minus its last letter(ending early).
5. Make subject in French school extremely welcome to classicists (7)
ENSLAVE : EN(French for “in”) + 1st and last letters of(… extremely) “school” + AVE(“welcome” to classicists studying Latin).
9. Starters of buckwheat liked in Novosibirsk and Irkutsk (5)
BLINI : 1st letters, respectively, of(Starters of) “buckwheat liked in Novosibirsk and Irkutsk“.
Defn: Pancakes made from buckwheat flour, originally from Russia where Novosibirsk and Irkutsk are located.
10. She could produce The Mousetrap (9)
DAIRYMAID : Cryptic defn: Presumably a reference to the nursery rhyme, “Three Blind Mice”, in which the rodents ran after the farmer’s wife who used a carving knife …. The whole drama could have been averted if the farmer’s employee had produced a mousetrap (not the famous Agatha Christie play, of course).
Per KVa@1&2: One who could make/produce a third-grade flavourless or textureless version of any particular cheese, the former derogatively called a “mousetrap cheese”.
11. Investor holding the cards dealt a blow (4-6)
BACK-HANDER : BACKER(one who backs, financially/an investor) containing(holding) HAND(the cards dealt to any one of the players in a card game like bridge or poker).
12. Retreat from PM losing face (4)
LAIR : “Blair”(Tony, former UK PM) minus its 1st letter(losing face).
Defn: …/a refuge to retreat to for privacy or safety.
14. Led sister astray with notion of paradise? (6,6)
DESERT ISLAND : Anagram of(… astray) LED SISTER + AND(with/plus).
Defn: …/a place representing freedom from worldly cares and woes.
18. Novel feature of Attic civilisation (4,2,3,3)
ROOM AT THE TOP : Cryptic defn: What would be an item/feature of a hypothetical civilisation living in attics.
21. Couple conclude proceedings on board (4)
MATE : Double defn: 1st: …/to engage in sexual intercourse; and 2nd: … or checkmate, to end/conclude proceedings on board/a game on a chessboard with a winning move.
22. Rude character that is not apparent in Michael Caine’s performance (10)
MECHANICAL : Anagram of(…’s performance) [ “Michael Caine” minus(… not apparent) “i.e.”(abbrev. for “id est”/that is) ].
Defn: In Shakespeare’s “A Midsummer Night’s Dream”, one of the 6 amateur actors called “rude mechanicals” by Puck, in reference to their occupations as manual labourers.
25. Kent’s one comic figure? (9)
SUPERHERO : Superman, the alter ego of Clark Kent, was one such in the series of comics.
26. Unfit setter dozed in audition (5)
INAPT : I(the setter of this crossword using the self-referential pronoun) + homophone of(… in audition) “napped”(dozed/slept for a while).
27. Excess of devoutness — not the first — on Jewish Sabbath (7)
SATIETY : “piety”(devoutness/religiousness or reverence) minus its 1st letter(not the first) placed after(on) SAT(abbrev. for “Saturday” in the civil calendar, on which the Jewish Sabbath/day of rest falls).
Defn: …/surfeit.
28. Obsession with Paddington? It could merit a hard stare (7)
BUGBEAR : BUG(an obsession/an enthusiastic interest in something) plus(with) BEAR(an example of which is Paddington Bear, a fictional character in children’s literature).
Defn: “It” being an imaginary character invoked to frighten children/a bogeyman.
Down
1. Medic stops team leaders from buying extra drink (6)
IMBIBE : MB(abbrev. for “Medicinae Baccalaureus”, a doctor/a medic) contained in(stops) II(or 11/eleven, with the respective Roman numeral substitutions, a sports team of 11 players, as with a cricket team, say) + 1st letters, respectively, of(leaders from) “buying extra“.
Defn: To ….
2. Entertainer who sang for the young Elvis? (6)
PRINCE : What you might call Elvis Presley, dubbed the “King of Rock and Roll” when he was young and before being “crowned”.
3. Masquerading sheikhs and bishops enthralling a dish (5,5)
SHISH KEBAB : Anagram of(Masquerading) SHEIKHS plus(and) B,B(2 x abbrev. for “bishop”) containing(enthralling) A.
4. Author lying about haunt of vice in German port (5)
EMDEN : Reversal of(… lying about) ME(author/setter of this crossword using the self-referential pronoun) + DEN(a haunt of vice/a secluded place for illegal activities).
5. Rest in peace? Not a second of it, unfortunately, here (9)
EPICENTRE : Anagram of(unfortunately) “Rest in peace” minus(Not … of it,) “[ A + “s”(abbrev. for “second” in time notation) ].
Defn: The geographical point vertically above the focus of an earthquake, and where its force is the greatest. By extension, also the central point of any disturbance or difficult situation.
6. Well over 25% of yakitori is protein (4)
SOYA : SO(well/extremely, as in “he was well/so out of it”) placed above(over, in a down clue) 1st 2 out of 8 letters of(25% of) “yakitori“.
Defn: … derived from the beans of the same name.
7. Seaweed repeatedly gathered from prime locations in La Guaira (4-4)
AGAR-AGAR : 2nd, 3rd, 5th, and 7th letters of(gathered from prime locations in/letters in the 1st 4 prime number positions) “La Guaira” x 2(repeatedly …)
8. Con-artist’s seldom discovered casing wealthy place (2,6)
EL DORADO : [ DO(to con/to swindle) + RA(abbrev. for a member of the Royal Academy of Arts/an artist) ] contained in(… casing) “seldom” minus its 1st and last letters(discovered).
Defn: A legendary … where precious stones and gold coins were found in abundance.
13. Staggering… so daunting, but surprisingly impressive! (10)
ASTOUNDING : Anagram of(Staggering…) SO DAUNTING.
15. Very, very French — almost all attending Mass in old cathedral city (9)
EXTREMELY : [“tres”(French for very/exceedingly) minus its last letter(almost all) plus(attending) M(symbol for “mass” in physics) ] contained in(in) [ EX-(prefix signifying “old”/former) + ELY(a cathedral city in England) [.
16. Propositions put before half-hearted females (8)
PREMISES : PRE-(prefix signifying “before” in time, place, etc.) + “misses”(unmarried women/females) minus its central letter(hearted …).
Defn: … from which another is inferred or concluded.
17. Notice contains nothing on our weakness (4,4)
SOFT SPOT : SPOT(to notice/to perceive) containing(contains) [ O(letter representing 0/nothing) + FT’S(our, a first person possessive pronoun/belonging to the paper printing this crossword, the Financial Times, or FT) ].
19. Raise eco-tax within eight days (6)
OCTAVE : Reversal of(Raise, in a down clue) [ ECO containing(… within) VAT(abbrev. for “value added tax”) ].
Defn: A period of … starting with the day of a Church festival.
20. Governor tipped to take centre of industrial province (6)
ULSTER : “ruler”(governor/head) minus its 1st letter(tipped /with an end/tip removed) containing(to take) central 2 letters of(centre of) “industrial“.
Defn: Traditional Irish ….
23. Potential killer needs to extract drug from hard sweet (1-4)
H-BOMB : “E”(abbrev. for the drug Ecstasy) deleted from(extract … from) [ H(abbrev. for “hard”) + “bombe”(a frozen dome-shaped dessert/sweet) ].
24. Genuine grandeur that’s to some extent receding (4)
TRUE : Hidden in(… to some extent) reversal of(… receding) “grandeur that’s“.
DAIRYMAID
Found these lines somewhere
British cheese once had an appalling reputation, nicknamed “mousetrap”
If so…
mousetrap cheese
A derogatory phrase used to describe a cheese that has little or no texture or flavour when that particular verity of cheese is supposed to have a certain texture and/or flavour, however mild.
Indicated that the person thinks the cheese is only fit for use in a mouse trap.
Cheese is a mousetrap! 🙂
Thanks KVa.
28A. I’m not sure that the reference to “it” as a bogeyman is what is intended here. A “bugbear” is defined in Chambers as “an object of terror, dislike or annoyance”, so is something that could merit a hard stare. The surface reference is to the propensity of Paddington (the Michael Bond character) to give things he was wary of, or didn’t like, a “hard stare”.
Love this setter’s sneaky surfaces and really enjoyed this. Didn’t spot any feline nina but doing this for every puzzle would be a bit too restrictive. Given the news now, 5d is sadly all too appropriate.
Lets not forget that the play within the play in Hamlet was called The Mousetrap. Danish Blue?
I loved SATIETY and PRINCE
A great Tuesday challenge
Thanks scchua and Bobcat
Yes, when written EPICENTRE was sadly prescient.
I didn’t find this an easy ride. I couldn’t parse BUGBEAR and didn’t know about ‘mousetrap’ cheese; we used to call such cheese “soap”. We’ve had it before, but I’d also forgotten the ‘rude’ MECHANICAL(s). I enjoyed the Russian flavoured BLINI &lit. No feline Nina that I could see either.
Thanks to Bobcat and scchua
A fine crossword. Inventive cluing: “prime locations in La Guaira” is new to me. I like it.
“14. Led sister astray with notion of paradise? (6,6)”
Had to be SUNLIT UPLAND, where we all live now, since Brexit.
I liked DAIRYMAID for 10,000 reasons (see today’s Independent, for another fine puzzle).
Also BUGBEAR (an annoyance, to which Paddington would give one of his trademark hard stares),
the subtraction anagrams EPICENTRE & MECHANICALS,
and all the nice memory-jogging references to Elvis, PRINCE, Superman, Michael Caine, John Braine, Cheese (and other foods).
Thanks S&B
Thanks for the blog and the comments. Lots of entertaining clues here, but I am relieved that this was scchua’s turn on the schedule, since this was hard sledding for me. I was unfamiliar with “mousetrap,” but even so, I do not think the clue makes much sense, since it would seem that literally anyone in the world “could” produce such cheese–dairymaid, bus conductor, Nigella Lawson, etc. I am also not sure what “civilisation” is doing in 18A, other than providing some misdirection? Surely, an attic is already a “room at the top”? I realize now that I forgot to go back to parse SOFT SPOT, and was unaware of the further allusions underlying BUGBEAR and MECHANICALS. Not my best foray.
I wonder if Bobcat, like me, thinks Michael Caine couldn’t act his way out of a paper bag, and is having a dig at him in 22a, along with the nice Shakespearean reference? It made me laugh.
Cineraria @ 10 Perhaps I am missing something, but I fear I don’t understand your objection to the clue for DAIRYMAID. Collins defines the word as “a girl or woman who works in a dairy, esp one who milks cows and makes butter and cheese on a farm”, and “mousetrap” as “cheese of an indifferent quality”. So the clue works as CD because it satisfies the requirement that there is a legitimate second meaning in addition to the surface reading about the production of a play. As far as 18A is concerned, an “attic” need not be a room – the word is often used to describe something that is just a loft space in the roof. So to create a “room at the top”, such a space would need to be “civilised” (ie made fit for occupation).
Thanks for the blog, great set of clues , AGAR-AGAR is very clever, I have seen the prime number idea before but not often, I wonder if any setter has got up to eleven. EL DORADO is put together very well. Great ro see Paddington get a mention .
18A Attic with a capital A misdirects us all the way to Attica in Greece, the promontory where the Athenian civilisation arose.
Monday and Tuesday, back-to-back great puzzles in the FT.
Re 10d DAIRYMAID, I hadn’t heard of mousetrap as inferior cheese. While KVa@2&3 clearly has the correct parsing, I really like scchua’s interpretation.
I also read 28a BUGBEAR as Bobcat’s indirect shout out to Roz, although I don’t see any of hers in this puzzle (apart from it being too easy 😉 ).
Thanks Bobcat for the fun and scchua for the illustrated blog – that blini looks appealing.
Late, late comment just to echo Roz with praise for the primes clue. Bravo, Bobcat! And thanks for the blog, scchua.