Food on the Brain 🧠

Happy Friday! It’s busy times around the YEGwords household these days - not only are we incrementally moving into our new closet (see previous newsletter), but we are heading across the world soon to see a friend! Very exciting that I will get to visit two places that come up regularly in crosswords (UAE and ABU DHABI. Sorry DUBAI, you’re just not it).

This week’s crossword is a hair tougher than usual, if the test solve is anything to go by. Which is all I have to go off of, so… it is.

Discussion (and spoilers!) below the break.

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Food on the Brain by Brandon Cathcart

Discussion

There are a few sketchy entries in this puzzle, I’ll admit - this was one of those themes that I needed to cheese a few spots to make work. But it was worth it, I’ve decided! And FYI, if you read ["The male ___ to use the Borat voice anyone talks about their wife" (Tweet by @PostinMonkey, 11/8/21)] and thought “Ha! Brandon made a typo!,” you’re wrong - I never make typos - but also, that’s the original tweet lol.

M.I.A. up and disappeared on us, but not before she made a singular 2008-defining anthem. Thanks, M.I.A. I hope you’re doing well, wherever you are.

Today’s Theme

The four italicized entries make up today’s theme quatrain. Each clue asks for a hungry person/entity’s request (with a question mark, so you know some wordplay is going on). Their requests are common phrases for meals/snacks, but where the adjective has a slightly different meaning ;)

[Hungry party-pooper's request?'] is a SQUARE MEAL

[Famished ghost's request?] is a LATE LUNCH

[Peckish speedrunner's request?] is a QUICK BITE

[Glass eater's request?] is a LIGHT SNACK

Behind the Clues

1A. My partner/test solver was hesitant about this one, but I decided to keep it anyway (love me or hate me for it). You know something tricky is going on because [Period pieces, often?] ends in a question mark. So we know it’s not the period pieces we expect - rather, a common part of a menstrual period, CRAMPS.

18A. I can’t believe I got to put [___bak, rhyming voice recorder toy I owned in the 90s] into a crossword! The YAKbak was a defining toy of my childhood. And who can forget the YAKbakwards??

36A. In a crossword about food, it’s only fitting that at least one entry was about food. I love a good [Chinese steamed bun (my mouth is watering thinking about them)], a BAO, and I’d be lying if I said my mouth wasn’t watering again as I write this. Their pillowy texture is incredible.

1D. Okay, let’s get it out of the way - [Money that is often incorrectly described as cold and hard] is CASH, but what money is often correctly described as cold and hard? Coins. Cold coins, at least. But who wants to be paid in cold coins? Not me. “Room-temp bills or e-transfer only,” I say on all my Facebook Marketplace listings.

20D. I don’t watch a ton of movies, modern or classics. However, given how much Star Trek shows up in pop culture and how little I’ve seen of it, I was happy to finally watch Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan. In it, you may guess that the [Villain whose name William Shatner famously yells in the 1982 Star Trek movie I watched recently] is KHAN. KHAAAAAAN!!!

28D. Sure, [Zeus or Jupiter] could be considered a SKY GOD. “But aren’t all gods sky gods??” You ask? No. These ones are, though.

I hope you enjoyed this puzzle!

Until next week,

Brandon