Skinny provides our Thursday challenge this week.
A mixed bag today: I thought both 13a and 8d were a bit weak because the definition and wordplay are too similar, and there are a few loose definitions as noted below. But some really good clues too, especially where the anagram indicators look as though they belong with the fodder: muesli mostly nuts, camera shot, and vampire bats. Thanks Skinny for the fun.
Definitions are underlined; BOLD UPPERCASE indicates letters used in the wordplay; square brackets [ ] indicate omitted letters.
| ACROSS | ||
| 1 | FAJITA |
Healthy American eating a Japanese dish (6)
|
| FIT (healthy) + A (abbreviation for American), containing A + J (abbreviation for Japanese).
Dish as in prepared food – grilled meat and/or vegetables rolled in a tortilla. |
||
| 4 | JETSAM |
Beginning to justify mate’s untidy stuff getting washed up (6)
|
| Beginning letter of J[ustify] + anagram (untidy) of MATE’S.
Goods jettisoned from a ship to lighten its load in dangerous conditions, which may get washed up on shore. |
||
| 9 | PLAN |
Work out half of 4? Not quite (4)
|
| A rather devious wordplay: the first half of 4a is JET[sam], so we’re looking for PLAN[e] (as in jet plane) without the last letter (not quite). | ||
| 10 | PROVENANCE |
Established champion claims northern origin (10)
|
| PROVEN (established) + ACE (slang for someone expert or very successful = champion), around N (abbreviation for northern). | ||
| 11 | TOMATO |
Fruit characterised by overly dull jams (6)
|
| TOO (as in “too long” = overly), with MAT (alternative spelling of matt = dull rather than shiny) inserted into it (jamming).
Botanically a fruit, but usually eaten as a vegetable. |
||
| 12 | PRIMEVAL |
Ancient vampire bats fly without wings (8)
|
| Anagram (bats = crazy) of VAMPIRE, then [f]L[y] without the outer letters (wings). | ||
| 13 | DEMANDING |
Insisting on something being difficult (9)
|
| I think these are two different shades of the same basic meaning, rather than a true double definition. Asking forcefully for something; or descriptive of a task that requires (demands) a lot of skill, effort and/or concentration. | ||
| 15 | CEDE |
Abandon children, so it’s said (4)
|
| Sound-alike (so it’s said) of SEED = descendants. | ||
| 16 | PUSH |
Discharge with hard shove (4)
|
| PUS (a discharge from an infection) + H (abbreviation for hard). | ||
| 17 | DONCASTER |
Complete housing project by centre of picturesque UK city (9)
|
| DONE (complete), containing (housing) CAST (project, as a verb, as in casting a silhouette on a wall), then the centre letter of [pictu]R[esque].
City in South Yorkshire. |
||
| 21 | ARIDNESS |
Lack of moisture in canned sardines (8)
|
| Anagram (canned = slang for drunk) of SARDINES. | ||
| 22 | OLD AGE |
Good lord! See, on retiring, one’s second childhood (3,3)
|
| EGAD (an archaic expression of surprise, equivalent to “good lord!”) + LO (lo! = see!), all reversed (on retiring).
Old age may be a second childhood for some people, but I think many would object to the characterisation. |
||
| 24 | OUT ON A LIMB |
Forbidden city in Italy (in Italy!), overthrown, initially being isolated (3,2,1,4)
|
| OUT (forbidden), then MILANO (Italian name for the city known in English as Milan, so “a city in Italy as it is called in Italy”) reversed (overthrown), then the initial letter of B[eing]. | ||
| 25 | WHAM |
London team, not established club (4)
|
| W[est] HAM (London football team) without EST (abbreviation for established).
Club, as a verb = wham = to hit hard. |
||
| 26 | BISTRO |
Pen 40% of story inside restaurant (6)
|
| BIRO (the original brand name for a ballpoint pen, named after its Hungarian-born inventor László Bíró) with the first 40% of ST[ory] inside it.
By the rules of Crosswordland, if a restaurant isn’t TRAT (short for trattoria) then it’s probably BISTRO. |
||
| 27 | FRIEND |
Familiar way to have eggs – including a dash of nutmeg (6)
|
| FRIED (a way to eat eggs), containing the first letter (a dash) of N[utmeg].
Familiar, as a noun = a close friend. |
||
| DOWN | ||
| 1 | FULSOME |
Over the top of muesli, mostly nuts (7)
|
| Anagram (nuts = crazy) of OF MUESL[i] without the last letter (mostly).
Fulsome, as in “fulsome praise” = exaggerated = over the top. |
||
| 2 | JUNTA |
Trip one’s taken to the south exposing dictatorship (5)
|
| JAUNT (trip = a journey for pleasure), with the A (one) moved to the end (south, in a down clue).
Spanish word for a government or administrative body, but in English it almost always refers to a military dictatorship. |
||
| 3 | TYPHOID |
Mistake on documents masks hospital’s condition (7)
|
| TYPO (abbreviation for typographical error = a mistake in text) + ID (abbreviation for identity documents), containing (masking) H (abbreviation for hospital).
Condition as in medical condition: typhoid = a bacterial disease causing fever. |
||
| 5 | EMETIC |
Refer to Skinny being upset? It makes you sick! (6)
|
| CITE (refer to = quote) + ME (Skinny, our crossword setter), all reversed (upset = upwards in a down clue). | ||
| 6 | SHAPELESS |
Out of form son unlucky to take English (9)
|
| S (abbreviation for son) + HAPLESS (unlucky), containing E (abbreviation for English). | ||
| 7 | MACRAME |
Camera shot captures front of military craft … (7)
|
| Anagram (shot = wrecked) of CAMERA, containing the first letter (front) of M[ilitary].
Handicraft using knotted cord. |
||
| 8 | COMPANIONSHIP |
… support vessel in one’s flotilla? (13)
|
| Flotilla = a group of watercraft sailing together, so another one in the same flotilla of ships might be considered a COMPANION SHIP. | ||
| 14 | ASSIDUOUS |
Like I said regularly – two people, you and I – hard-working (9)
|
| AS (like) + alternate letters (regularly) from [i] S[a]I[d] + DUO (two people) + US (you and I). (Though the grammar isn’t quite right: we = you and I, us = you and me). | ||
| 16 | PERTURB |
Worry as forward with United starts to run backwards (7)
|
| PERT (forward = cheeky) + U (abbreviation for United) + starting letters of R[un] B[ackwards]. | ||
| 18 | CLOBBER |
25‘s clothes (7)
|
| Double definition. Reference to 25a WHAM = to hit hard; or clobber = slang for clothes. | ||
| 19 | ENGLAND |
Country‘s aim – installing good network (7)
|
| END (as in “to that end” = aim = target), containing G (abbreviation for good) + LAN (abbreviation for local area network). | ||
| 20 | REPAIR |
Marry after extremely regrettable service (6)
|
| PAIR (as a verb = join together = marry) after the end letters (extremes) of R[egrettabl]E.
A slightly loose definition: I’d think of “service” (as in a car’s annual service) as making sure it continues to work correctly, and “repair” as fixing it when it doesn’t. But there’s some overlap between the two I suppose. |
||
| 23 | DOWSE |
With spades gathered, should you and I look for water? (5)
|
| DO WE (do we . . .? = should you and I?), containing S (abbreviation for spades in card games). |
WHAM was a clever bit of wordplay, but I didn’t think the definition quite worked. PLAN was too clever for me, though it’s obvious now. FULSOME was my favourite.