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Bit of pork, but not in a congressional bill / WED 10-11-23 / Garlic in Guadalajara / People of northern Scandinavia / Alternative to mushrooms / Fitting way to invest in Campbell's / Nut once used as an ingedient in Coke
Wednesday, October 11, 2023
Constructor: Miranda Kany
Relative difficulty: Easy
Theme answers:
- ONION (16A: Real tear-jerker?)
- ANDOUILLE (17A: Bit of pork, but not in a congressional bill)
- PEPPER (26A: Stuff it!)
- CAYENNE (29A: Something that's red-hot in the kitchen?)
- CHICKEN (48A: Scaredy-cat)
- CELERY (50A: Stick in a salad?)
- WHITE RICE (64A: What pales in comparison to other carbs?)
- STOCK (66A: Fitting way to invest in Campbell's)
Lucas Sinclair is one of the four central protagonists (alongside Mike Wheeler, Dustin Henderson and Will Byers) of the Stranger Things franchise.He is one of the four original protagonists. He also serves as the main protagonist of the novel, Lucas on The Line.
He is the older brother to Erica Sinclair, the best friend of Will Byers, Mike Wheeler, Dustin Henderson and Eleven, as well as the boyfriend of Max Mayfield.
He is portrayed by Caleb McLaughlin, who also voiced Gary Goodspeed as a child in Final Space. (hero.fandom.com)
• • •
Is the AJO in the JAMBALAYA? Do you put AJO in JAMBALAYA? Pretty sure you do, only here it's just sitting there, outside the theme, and in Spanish. A stray would-be themer. "Hey guys, what about me?" Sorry, AJO, I know you're in a central position, but you're not part of the action today. You just sit there and look fresh (it's been 28 years since AJO was in the grid!). I enjoyed learning AJO—the puzzle was so easy and the theme so straightforward that AJO felt like a real point of interest today. Had a nice false-theme moment when I thought ROCK MUSIC was going to be ROCK [&] ROLL at 14A: Output of the Rolling Stones, appropriately. An ampersand rebus!, I thought. But then no. Just a recipe. I like ANDOUILLE as an answer, and thought that since it was italicized and had a wacky-clue, maybe there was some wordplay going on in the answer ... stared at ANDOUILLE for a bit trying to imagine what that could be, then moved on, eventually discovering that no ... it's just a recipe. So the first two long Acrosses each gave me hopeful theme vibes, which made my eventual discovery of the actual theme that much more disappointing. The fill is pretty disappointing today too. A parade of STALES: ELWES, EENY, ACER, ICEE, RIRI, ENT, AEON, MUSΓE, ALOE, etc. None of it gruesome, but too much of it ho-hum. I enjoyed seeing ITHACA. I try to get up there several times a month to see a movie at Cinemapolis and maybe grab something to eat (this past weekend, it was Ethiopian food at Hawi). Here's a picture of me a few weeks ago in ITHACA with crossword constructors Robyn Weintraub (a Cornell alum, and Cornell mom, and Cornell booster) and Rachel Fabi (who teaches bioethics at Upstate Medical University in nearby Syracuse):
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| [I'm the tall one] |
It's approaching peak leaf season, so it's a good time to get up that part of the country, or any part of the NE with deciduous trees. My maples are about a week or so from peaking. They're mostly shedding, much to the dismay of my constantly leaf-battling neighbor. We just let the leaves sit so kids can play in them and people can take pictures. One lady even asked if she could take a leaf home with her once, because she missed autumn and didn't have turning leaves wherever she lived now. I was like "uh, it's a leaf ... there are thousands ... so yes, please, help yourself!" Anyway, enjoy whatever fall beauty you've got. See you tomorrow.
Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld
[Follow Rex Parker on Twitter and Facebook]
Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld
[Follow Rex Parker on Twitter and Facebook]
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83 comments:
Fairly easy except for the North. And my problems were on me, not the puzzle. I really need to read up on Narnia, learn about Northern indigenous people and review George Eliot. Other than that, what @Rex said.
Thx, Miranda for this spicy feast! π
Med.
Steady progress most of the way.
Had to come back to finish off ANDOUILLE.
Jambalaya (On the Bayou) ~ Hank Williams
Fun solve; liked it a lot! :)
___
Anna Shechtman's Mon. New Yorker was relatively easy (1 NYT Sat.); Montana & the Dakotas were a bit tricky.
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Peace π πΊπ¦ ~ Compassion ~ Tolerance ~ Kindness, Freudenfreude & a DAP to all π π
Well, I have to agree with Rex on this puzzle basically all the way through. I feel like the other recent recipe puzzle might have also been a soup? But don’t actually care enough about either puzzle to look it up. That said, there was nothing really annoying or sigh-inducing about this one beyond the gimmicky theme, so I’ll take it.
As for fall leaf peeping, welp, buckle up for a screed. Here in the northern Catskills at 1900’ elevation, the maples are almost wrapped up for the season, seemingly most of them on my (landlord’s) two acres of lawn. About 1.5 acres of that lawn is dotted and lined with red maples, which is stunning for about two weeks and also the bane of my weekends for about a month. I’m not exaggerating when I say that me, my leaf blower, my rake, and my tarps will be easily tending to 1.5 tons of leaves. I’ve fantasized about advertising leaf raking on Airbnb as a genuine Catskills fall time experience.
It’s a bit wild to be a full-time resident in a tourist area this time of year. Of course leaf peepers are super welcome, and encouraged (I used to be one!). And, some visitors’ lack of awareness that not every person on these roads and in these woods is a tourist is really something. We don’t have many alternate routes up here; the geography means we all have to take the same 1-2 lane mountain passes to work and school and life in general. And yet tourists will drive a full 10-20 miles under the speed limit and fail to pull over to let folks pass when they can, or sometimes just fully stop in the middle of the road to take pictures with no warning. Don’t get me started about folks who forget to turn off their brights when approaching you! Le sigh.
All that to say, it’s been such an eye-opening experience being on the other side of the rural resident/tourist divide. Oh, and can I interest anyone in an authentic mountaintop leaf raking experience? Anyone?!
OFL wrote, “Where's the ‘puzzle’? The cleverness, the wordplay, the anything?” I agree, but I liked it anyway even tho it seemed a bit easy even for Wednesday.
And I wonder how many puzzles we’d have in a year the met Rex’s high standards? A couple dozen, mebbe?
One nit to pick: I solve on paper, and when I printed it there were no italics in the clues. That didn’t matter much, but I wonder why.
It did remind me of the time I skipped out of a conference at Syracuse to go have jambalaya at Moosewood in Ithaca. Plus one for that.
Sometimes I mention the constructor's notes, which are found in the WordPlay blog, in my comments. I thought today's note was touching and beautiful. Here it is:
I’m originally from New York, and currently based in Philly. I’m a chef with my own boutique catering company, and the mother of two teenage boys. The theme is an old favorite, tried and true, and took ages to make fit. Last fall, the Sunday before Thanksgiving I was making 90-some-odd apple pies for my kids’ school, for their teachers, that all spelled out ‘T-H-A-N-K Y-O-U’ in pastry. I was an achy, sticky mess. The kitchen was covered in peels, cinnamon, smelling like heaven. I got the NYT acceptance email in the middle of all the apple-y pandemonium and chortled for joy! Then I fired off a text to John McIlvain, my father-in-law in Maine, to let him know. He was so excited for me, and he loved doing the puzzle every day, too. He replied immediately, “Wonderful, wonderful.” He lived another week. Dedicating this to his memory with so much love, apples of gold, in settings of silver.
Saw the ingredients got the theme (which then helped me pick up ANDOUILLE- because, well Jambalaya is simply ALWAYS made with ANDOUILLE). Unfortunately, that whole northern section with SAMI, MILL, ASLAN, MUSEE and AEON just left a foul smell lingering in the air - which is definitely something you don’t want lingering around your kitchen.
Two huge problems with AJO - first of all it’s definitely an ingredient in Jambalaya along with the Trinity, and secondly, what a great example of WS paying lip service to the “common usage” requirement for the foreign stuff.
This one had a ton of potential, but every chef worth his/her salt knows that “If you can lean, you can clean” and unfortunately this one neglected to take out the garbage and the odor emanating from the north just spoiled the meal.
Anyone have a problem with "a eon"? Shouldn't it be "an eon"? Sigh
Okay, that’s beautiful. Thanks for sharing and lifting it up here.
3-way Natick up top. (Is that a thing?)
S__I
_SLAN
_ILL
All three well out of my wheelhouse. Could have been anything. The rest of the puzzle definitely played "EASY."
My puzzle when I printed it had no italics for the ingredients. I was able to solve the puzzle easily without that. Sort of surprised since the revealer made such a big deal of that
Aeon is the British spelling.
Clue for CHICKEN seems like a big outlier, as all the other ingredients are clued for the ingredient, where CHICKEN is not.
We had a 'vichysoisse' recipe puzzle pretty recently I might have appreciated this one more if they were not so close together (checks ... 12/15/22 was the last one). I vote for a gai nu rong recipe next. But not until 2025 or later.
Two NYT puzzles for Miranda, both recipe-driven, her first with the ingredients for guacamole. Guacamole and Cajun food – both reside in my gastronomic Valhalla, thus Miranda resides firmly on my good side.
Second day in a row with a huge number of theme-related squares – 67 – more than a third of the white squares! It takes great skill to create a junk-lite puzzle under such constraint, and brava to Miranda for that. Also, lovely answers BARRE, ANDOUILLE, STRUT, NOW NOW, and NAΓVE.
The puzzle tripped off memories of a magical vacation with my wife in New Orleans, where we immersed in Cajun food, authentic have-to-move-to jazz, and each other.
Your beautifully written notes, Miranda, touched my heart as well, and reminded me that feeling love for my dear ones is not enough; I need to express it as well whenever possible (those notes in my previous post). So, much goodness thrown into the box today, making it richer than simply a fill-in. Thank you so much for this!
I went to Cornell and Enjoyed seeing Ithaca in there as well. This is peak season! the leaves are breathtaking.
The food in NOLA is CREOLE food. It is related and uses many of the same ingredients as CAJUN food. But those two distinct cultures are NOT THE SAME.
I thought it was cute, but probably a better fit for a Monday or Tuesday. My old man eyes have a hard time seeing circles in the app on my phone, but I guessed at JAMBALAYA early on and was right! Screwed myself a bit by confidently putting LOUIS instead of LUCAS (I’m not very familiar with Stranger Things but it’s incredibly popular so I think it’s fair game). But otherwise a quick fun solve.
Ah - the recipe theme. I think the last one we had was the guac puzzle? It is just a list of things - I guess enjoyable if you’re interested - but in the end is more Highlights than NYT.
VIVA
I liked CHASM, NOW NOW and the placement of the revealer dead center. JONI and AC DC crossing ROCK MUSIC was cool.
I’m sure some will really love this one.
ITHACA
Hand up for the "no italics, but so what" experience. I did find it to be segmented, but maybe "choppy" was another food reference.
AJO was a gimme, LUCAS and the APPS not so much. Can never remember Ms. ELWES last name and my lack of a smart phone made the MUTE button a little hard to see.
As for leaf peeper stories, it's high season around here. Our Monday night hootenanny has moved to a local inn which means we sometimes attract a small audience, I met a very nice couple from Arkansas who were doing the whole route and heading for Bar Harbor as an end point. Hope they have reservations, because things get jam-packed. At least two famous farms for foliage photographers had to have local roads closed because of the overwhelming numbers of folks who wanted to take pictures, but also park on the lawns and use their bathrooms and so on. Thanks a lot, social media. And I haven't even mentioned the tour buses.
Nice enough Wednesday, MK. My Kind of food puzzle, and thanks for some spicy fun.
Something's Ajar Sami Barre. Here just north of the South the leaves are just turning and with a trip planned to see the leaves up north in two weeks, hope a few are left on the trees.
Fun puzzle. I see the recipe instruction is there too, Mix. Sped through, down, across, Down, etc. right to the end. Not my usual Wednesday experience.
Closest I come to cooking these days is The Great British Baking Show. The new season is here and it's good again.
As always, I solved this with Across Lite, so I had no italicized clues, which maybe made this a bit trickier since I didn’t know what was theme-related and what wasn’t. I don’t really disagree with Rex, but gimme some good creole (not Cajun) jambalaya in Nola and an Abita and I’ll be very happy indeed.
Happy International Day of the Girl Child and National Coming Out Day.
I’m completely challenged when it comes to cooking and, furthermore, I’m familiar with Cajun cuisine only as a bunch of words (such as gumbo and Γ©touffΓ©e) not as a bunch of flavors, so I wouldn’t know a JAMBALAYA if it jumped up and kissed me on the mouth. I’d never heard of ANDOUILLE until this morning. Even so, the puzzle wasn’t particularly hard as the other ingredients were gettable from clues or inferable from crosses. I agree we’ve had this type of recipe puzzle before and really, it’s a form of tribute puzzle. Those always seem to work best for people who are enthusiastic about the thing being celebrated. And I’m happy to acknowledge JAMBALAYA as a classic, even though it’s beyond my dining experience.
Not too many problems along the way, although I couldn’t think of the first letter of SAMI initially (hah!) and kept trying to stick in C or T. For [Guiding principle] at 27D I had “moral” and “tenet” before finally settling on ETHIC. Spelled KOLA with a C. Found myself saddled with a typo at the end and racked up aggravating nanoseconds trying to find it. Turned out I had ROUe instead of ROUX. (Definition of ROUe in cooking: Debauched base of a white sauce.)
UNICLUES:
1. Comportment after consuming the perfect JAMBALAYA.
2. My absolutely most boring boyfriend.
3. Product of OHEC (Organization of Hallucinogenic Exporting Countries).
4. Singer-songwriter Mitchell’s current relationship with Spotify.
5. What had better be thick for a plunge into the rough-and-tumble world of online dating.
1. ANDOUILLE STRUT
2. LUCAS WHITERICE
3. ARAB PACT LSD
4. JONI ETHIC MUTE
5. SUITOR’S SKIN
From yesterday, thanks to @Nancy, @Gary Jugert, @jberg, @Carola, @Gill I., @Whatsername, @Masked and Anonymous, and @okanaganer for the welcome back. Not sure it’s deserved, though, as I’ll probably continue to disappear for unspecified lengths of time.
@Gill: It’s really so perfect that you were a GOGO DANCER. I’ll bet you were a knockout.
@Whatsername: I’ve adopted her as a granddaughter in my heart, although she’s actually my husband’s grandchild. But nothing could be better than having 3 Grammas (I hope).
@okanaganer: Never worry – email me!
@Anonymous (6:49 PM): Yup, still around. There’s a slew of them in the area near me.
[SB: Yd, 0. So satisfying when it all falls into place.]
Oh, and here in Western Mass, where the leaves are usually jaw-dropping spectacular right now, we have mostly a dull brown dud. There are splashes and pockets of color here and there, but nowhere near normal. Some say it’s because of how much rain we had this year, some say it’s because we haven’t had cold enough nights. I have no idea, but it’s kinda sad.
There are a hell of a lot of Cajun restaurants in New Orleans. Though I agree: Creole is the predominant cuisine there.
Enjoyed this one! Food themes have been done before, but that shouldn't be a reason to dislike them. AJO was the only good crossing for CAJUN, fitting in with the food theme.
Thanks @Lewis for posting the constructor notes. In art and music, how we perceive things depends so much on the context. Very touching indeed.
I had forgotten the guacamole theme. So that's three recipe themes in the last ten months.
Hey All !
Rex: "Like it needed more time to cook." Har! I see what you did there.
Also, chuckled at the description on your pic. Thanks for the clarification. π
Decent puz. That's quite a bit of ingredients. Eight ingredients (Themers), plus a Revealer And what it is in the top and bottom rows. A lot of stuff to work around, so again, I give iffy fill a pass. Agree with Rex on why AJO wasn't thrown in the mix (π). Not sure how'd you clue it to match the Themer clues, however.
@pablo
Not to rub salt (a missed ingredient?) into a wound, but the clue for 23D has Monster in it! Har.
Wednesday, ATOP of the hump. Nice view up here.
One F
RooMonster
DarrinV
@bocamp ππfor humming that as I solved!
What’s anonymous @7:51 said New Orleans has some great Cajun restaurants but it’s history is Creole Go down below I-10 for Cajun country how about Lafayette or New Iberia Morgan City or Lafitte
I think I'd got as far as ANDOUILLE and CAYENNE when I decided to see what was in those circles at the top. JAMBA! Since there were four more circles at the bottom, the theme was clear. That helped a lot in answering the italicized clues; but it would have been nice to see some okra in there.
Well, it's true that Creole is the indigenous cuisine in NOLA, but there's plenty of Cajun as well. And the clue simply asked for a city where Cajun is popular, so that's OK.
I loved the puzzle, enjoy Jambalaya and thought the sentiment behind the construction of the crossword was so touching! I just read that the next town over from mine was rated one of the best in the state for beautiful autumn leaves. It’s not really a destination kind of place so I don’t anticipate any travelers. But I feel grateful to be able to enjoy it on my daily rounds!
The ASLAN/SAMI/MILL area was tough, the rest was easy.
I guessed STALED without realizing it is a legitimate verb form. I ignored the theme, which would have made the solve harder for me, not easier.
We lived in Ithaca for 10 years with an acre of maples. Like Weezie (6:05 AM) that meant raking all weekend for a month for kids and me. This also clashed with prime sailboat winterizing chores.
The upside was a 5’ enclosure around our blueberry bushes. Leaves dumped to the brim gradually packed down to 6”. The berries loved the acidity and water retention, growing large and plentiful - we ate what we could and the kids sold the rest at about 10% of market price. Happy Memories!
My parents lived for 2 years in the late 1930s in Port Sulphur LA where my mother learned how to cook what everyone there called CAJUN dishes . These included gumbo, crawfish ètouffèe, red beans and rice, shrimp remoulade, lots of dishes with redfish. Are these really Creole? There was always rice in one way or the other. Delicious!
I check Rex's column maybe twice a month just for fun, usually when I think I have an idea of what the rant-o-the-day will be. Thought for sure he'd go off on the grid, with the dead-end caverns, esp NE and SW. Wrong!
You can put ONION, PEPPER, CAYENNE and ANDOUILLE in your grid but that won't make your puzzle spicy.
You can put CELERY in your grid, but that won't make your puzzle crunchy.
One of the most resoundingly uninteresting puzzles I've ever done -- and on a Wednesday yet. I can't wait to see what positives Lewis has managed to find in it. I can't find a single one. Not one standout bit of fill and not one single standout clue.
@Guacamole remembering people, see Lewis above. Same constructor.
@Smith (8:51 AM) π
___
Peace π πΊπ¦ ~ Compassion ~ Tolerance ~ Kindness, Freudenfreude & a DAP to all π π
@Lewis 6:44 Thank you for passing on Miranda’s beautiful note. I used to read notes etc. at Xword Info and I miss them. I guess I’ll have to find WordPlay.
Naticked on 5 Across(SA_I) and 7 Down (_ILL).
Otherwise found it very enjoyable.
We went to Moosewood last year in Ithaca and were quite disappointed. Gimme Coffee however…one of the really great coffee shops. The one in Trumansburg has a delightful patio out back overlooking the water. Highly recommend that and the fabulous Farmer’s market.
Roux does not belong in jambalaya!!! It is the basis of gumbo! Also, jambalaya is NOT a soup! Geez.
@Nancy (9:24). Great comment. Witty and dead-center.
This would have been a fine Monday puzzle, but I found it ridiculously easy for Wednesday. Not my best time but only a few seconds off. And yesterday was my best Tuesday time. And both were faster than my average Monday time. I found it fine except that it offered no resistance at all - I like a little more chew in my Wednesday stew.
Blazed through this one despite never visiting NOLA, never trying JAMBALAYA, and only being vaguely aware of where the kitchen is in my house (that room where the coffee pot is I understand), so I relied heavily on drinking ALE, using LSD (an alternative to mushrooms only in a "Just Say No" ad), and being SNIDE.
You cross ROCK MUSIC with AC/DC and then clue it as electricity? Tone deaf.
Listen, I write uniclues every day because they amuse me, I use them as songwriting prompts (the Cheez-It Sonata is in heavy production as we speak), and once in a blue moon somebody says, "heh, good one," but today a bit of constructioneering leaves me so baffled I wonder if our grid builder is even trying. In plain site at eye level, Miranda lays out PEPPER CAYENNE. Backward! I have to just walk away from the incident. No (~) is gonna fix that.
And I agree: VIVA RIRI.
@π¦: We are a couple weeks past the aspens turning up here in the Rockies and I have a camera roll full of photos that all look the same and are vastly underwhelming compared to the live trek.
Uniclues:
1 Where sorority girls sit in bad movies.
2 Turning aside my wrinkled up face when I hear the snap snap snap of the electronic ignition as I assume (apparently) such an action will preserve my beauty through the inevitable (I believe) explosion, for example.
3 Place for mediocre love making down by the river.
4 Organ mostly covered in cloth hoping to be played.
5 A vegetarian.
6 Walking a pig down to the slaughterhouse.
1 ATOP SEALED ALE
2 OVEN ISSUES TIC (~)
3 MEH NOW NOW VAN
4 SUITOR'S SKIN
5 STOCK LIFE SAVER
6 ANDOUILLE STRUT
My Fascinating Crossword Uniclue Keepsake from Last Year: Sticky note on the vision board at a jaded DC editor's meeting to plan their latest derivative sequel. INANE SUPER GIRL.
¯\_(γ)_/¯
I’m originally from New Orleans and thought the same thing as the theme came together for me; Lafayette is a capital of Cajun cuisine in my book! That said, lots of people I grew up with were Cajun or had Cajun ancestry, and Cajun food is not at all hard to find in SE Louisiana, so I think it’s close enough. And I did enjoy the theme! A nice break from the more typical NY-centric stuff (and I’m saying that as a New Yorker).
No italics but no problem. It was easy enough to figure out a themers once I saw the circles. Definitely made me hungry for JAMBALAYA which sounds perfect for our first really chilly weather coming up this weekend. One thing I kept looking for in the grid though, was okra. Just seemed like a crossword about CAJUN food oughta have it.
Enjoyed reading the leaf peeper stories from those in the northeast. I have never seen it IRL but it appears spectacular in the pictures. The foliage here in the southern Midwest is nothing to sneeze at but it’s barely begun to turn, just a few glimpses here and there. That doesn’t discourage the tour buses though which are out in full force for fall craft fairs, country music shows etc.
Puzzle was MEH, but nice to see some favorite xword folk in tandem with OFL. Off to see if Gorski is more engaging.
I'm with @Rex all the way today.
Ditto to 9:38 @Tale appreciation for @Lewis and the wordplay note. I just don’t find the “official” responses as much fun on the NYT site as RP or the sadly missed JEFF critiques at xwordinfo.
Favorite cartoon: commercial truck with technician blowing autumn leaves unto a barren looking suburban lawn
Easy? Yes…but thoroughly enjoyable and perfect for a Wednesday nestled next to the food section.
Easy-medium. CAJUN cooking works for me, liked it more than @Rex did.
@Lewis - thanks for posting the note, I miss Jeff and Xwordinfo.
FOOD and leaf droppings....Can it get better?
@Weezie 6:05. You take the cake by starting off with your leaf escapade. Raking on Airbnb! Que idea...
@Lewis 6:44. Thank you for sharing Miranda's notes. Heartwarming indeed!
If I ever construct a puzzle, my first choice for a theme just might be food. It would be Cuban and all the clues would be in Spanish. I can hear heads exploding already. My circled letters would spell out PICADILLO...PICA and DILLO. Best friends making Black Beans. Hah! it would probably take me a century to complete.
I thought this was cute. An ANDOUILLE here, a CHICKEN there and everything else in the pot. All it needed was some salt and pepper. Done!
I'm loving the leaf turning stories. I am surrounded by a million trees and squirrels. We have leaf blowers come in every Tuesday and Friday and I want to gently kill them. They are friendly, though and they all speak Spanish. I go out and chat with them and ask them why they start at 8am til around 11 and then stop the noise. Then they appear again around 1 and continue blowing until around 4. They tell me that they need to have "lonche"....Usually a bocadillo de jamon and if they're lucky, Mamacitas home-made Tamales.
We have some trees that turn a beautiful red but that lasts for about one day and then mighty winds come and blow the leaves off. Some turn a golden yellow and seem to hang on for dear life. All the squirrels are busy now collecting what they can and storing them god knows where....then bang, it's winter.
@Barbara S: LUCAS WHITERICE had me squealing.....
Food for thought: What does "Ropa Vieja" have in common with "Rabo encendido" ...?
Granted, Rex, but it did make me hungry
The North East generally, still hasn't had a frost, hard frost, or freeze. Any one of which runs in mid-October, so not likely the reason for the drab trees. OTOH, the maple in our yard is bright red, but shedding handily.
Just MEH.
And as a fan of the Stones gotta say they would hate that clue.
@Roo-A few years ago my granddaughter's first AND last names were both in the same puzzle.
pablotryingtosavefaceguy
I prepare CAJUN and Creole dishes regularly, mostly Γ©touffΓ©es. The italicized ingredients in the puzzle all belong in CAJUN jambalaya, but if that's all that went into the dish, it would be a sad little stew. Yes, AJO is in the grid, but not GARLIC, either italicized or not. Without that, and bay leaf, salt & pepper, thyme, parsley and gumbo file, it ain't no jambala on my table. Fortunately, roux isn't italicized, as that doesn't belong in the dish (although some would disagree).
Easy and enjoyable puzzle, though.
The Circles! And nice foodie puz. Recognized all the ingredients except for ANDOUILLE.
staff weeject pick: AJO. Was a no-know, at our house. Learned a new J-word.
some fave stuff: SCOOTED. NOWNOW. ELWES [with ref to a real cool flick]. ACDC crossin ROCKMUSIC.
Thanx for the recipe bits, Ms. Kany darlin.
Masked & Anonymo5Us
**gruntz**
Stuart 6:21 I had the same problem And it did seem important to know which clues were italicized so I looked back at the computer and marked them on the paper.
But WHY NYT???
@Southside Johnny???"Left a smell? Strange comment. I thought sami was one of the more original and all of them interesting answers more original and interesting answers.
@Miranda Kany: I just read your puzzle backstory which Lewis so kindly posted, and I am touched almost beyond words. So glad that you had the opportunity to share that special moment with your father-in-law. I liked your puzzle but the knowledge of such a cherished memory and the thought of all those apple pies makes it all the more sweet to savor.
@Lewis (6:44) THANK YOU for sharing.
I figured it was a JAMBALAYA puzzle early and, I'm not making this up, I started to salivate! Not a Homer Simpson open-mouth drool but more of an anticipatory soupçon of saliva.
I love garlic so AJO is definitely in my turista level EspaΓ±ol vocabulary. For you NorteΓ±os, it's pronounced AH-ho.
Had I not gone into education, I would have been a landscaper. I advocate a close to nature approach and would say to all those facing acres of fallen leaves, leave those leaves alone! Over time their decay will replenish nutrients in the soil and they will act as both soil moisture stabilizers and weed controllers. They will also play a pivotal role in the local ecosystem by creating shelter for insects, worms, grubs, etc. If desired, narrow pathways can be cleared among the trees to provide for a reflective, Walden Pond like stroll on a sunny winter day. Plus it avoids the noise and pollution of leaf blowers, mulchers and leaf burning.
@bocamp 6:02, you beat me to it. Hank Williams JAMBALAY (On the Bayou) is a classic. I never get tired of listening to it and singing along. Here's a YouTube version with lyrics.
Hands up for wanting ROCK N ROLL which because it has stones and rolling would have been even more "appropriate" than ROCK MUSIC. Also it's a more vivid phrase.
Here in the interior of BC, the leaves are going straight from browny-green to brown, I guess because of the drought. Exactly 30 years ago this week, I was in Vermont, New York, and Pennsylvania, and the leaves were pretty darn fine. Perfect timing to visit Frank Lloyd Wright's Fallingwater near Pittsburgh.
A request for people posting video links: they are much appreciated, but please put some hint in the text of what the video is, instead of just "this". It takes ages for the Youtube page to load only to see that it's often not something I want to watch, so I don't bother, and I might be missing out.
@Barbara S, "nothing could be better than having 3 Grammas"... well, I had 4! But no memories of my mom's first husband's mom, since she chose to be a stranger, unfortunately. But my dad's first wife's mom was a hoot... she started talking in a Scottish accent after a single drink.
I'm used to seeing the AEON spelling from Spelling Bee. Speaking of which,
[Tues 0, no goofy words!]
Am I the only one who had WHITE WINE for WHITE RICE (67A)? Guess where my head's at.
Interesting that jambalaya (I know it’s not an answer) cayenne and andouille are imported into American English (jambalaya ultimately from Africa and cayenne ultimately from Indian languages around Cayenne in South America ,andouille French) and that’s ok with you but other imported words like Sami are not. It just shows that sometimes crosswords are in one’s wheelhouse and sometimes are not. Sami is not a “junk” word.
No more than say Portugal is.
BTW Sami replaced the Swedish import Laplander as part of the recent trend to use indigenous words.
Yes, you should add some ajo to your jambalaya. But the thing you REALLY need is roux (12 down), which some of your commenters have probably pointed out already.
Thought you would mention an “old friend “ Bic, which we haven’t seen in a while. Also maybe aeon because that spelling hasn’t been around at least to my mind. I thought the clue for Bic was original though. Maybe not.
This is my favorite kind If puzzle, not for the theme but for the use of a rarely used word and also the pronunciation of STALED as a verb! Bravo! I would imagine most people have never used or seen this form of stale. The foreign word is AJO. Someone commented that it was pronounced as ah- ho That was sorta correct. Actually you must pronounce the JO with a slight raspy ho sound. Another interesting aspect of the pronunciation of the j is that that is the closet thing in Spanish to an h sound.
Very interesting puzzle!
That is beautiful, thank you for sharing.
@bocamp and @Anoa Bob -- What a wonderfully happy and infectious song. I've never heard it and I enjoyed it immensely. Thanks for the link.
I understand your opinions but this one pandered to me. It was my fastest Wednesday ever (on my phone), I live in Ithaca, and I absolutely love to cook. Oh and I watch a TV show about once a year and am usually clueless about TV, but I actually know Stranger Things. It was made for me.
Next time you’re in Ithaca try out Mama Said, and don’t miss Khmer Angkor at the farmers market. Also Lev Kitchen on the commons is great. If you haven’t tried all these yet.
I love this post. And a tad jealous of you for having so much beauty around. (Even if the leaves are a PITA.)
@Nancy (8:13 PM)
Yw! π
___
Peace π πΊπ¦ ~ Compassion ~ Tolerance ~ Kindness, Freudenfreude & a DAP to all π π
Of course you CAN get Cajun food in NOLA. You can get it in NYC too. But the food OF NOLA is Creole.
Great idea to offer a New England Leaf-Raking Eco- Experience. Offer a bowl of chowda with some sourdough, and I'm sure you will attract hundreds! By the way, I always look forward to your posts.
So touching. I think this is a reminder that there are real people behind these beautiful Crossword gifts, and that they never deserve some of the vitriol directed at them in this blog. Thanks, Lewis, for highlighting the constructor's comments!
Well, that pork thingie does not belong in a midweek grid, and PEPPER CAYENNE seems YODASPEAK, the way it appears. It's a heavy theme, with all those ingredients, so a strain on the fill. Pulled off about as well as can be expected, methinks.
My paper does not italicize clues, ever. So there was that handicap, but it still wasn't that hard. Par.
Wordle birdie.
Pretty MEH.
CHICKEN MAN
JONI got so SNIDE with RAY -
her NAIVE SUITORS will avow.
Some ELDER ISSUES caused DELAY
when JONI cried,"Oh, ROCK me NOW!"
--- LUCAS VAN ELWES
I've made JAMBALAYA, and all that stuff is in there. And how about ROUX? Or is that for gumbo? JONI Mitchell turned 80 the other day. Where does the time go?
DEAD in the corners.
Another wordle phew after - count 'em - 5 shots at BGGGG.
Challenging and rewarding to solve.
The only real "toughie" was easily figured out by the crosses. So...a perfectly acceptable Wednesday. Now I want some JAMBALAYA. But instead I'm going to get a Thursday puzzle tomorrow.
Will someone push the Syndie button already?????
Lady Di
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