LA Times Crossword 18 Jun 24, Tuesday

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Constructed by: Susan Gelfand
Edited by: Patti Varol

Today’s Reveal Answer: Stuffed Tomatoes

Themed answers each include a type of TOMATO, split between the beginning and end:

• 59A Rice-filled appetizers with red shells, and a hint to the words that bookend 17-, 30-, and 42-Across : STUFFED TOMATOES

• 17A Fondly remembered moment : CHERISHED MEMORY (a stuffed “CHERRY”)
• 30A Netflix’s “The Crown,” for one : ROYAL DRAMA (a stuffed “ROMA”)
• 42A Pretend to be asleep : PLAY POSSUM (a stuffed “PLUM”)

Read on, or jump to …
… a complete list of answers

Bill’s time: 5m 01s

Bill’s errors: 0

Today’s Wiki-est Amazonian Googlies

Across

10 Elton John’s “Bennie and the __” : JETS

“Bennie and the Jets” was a big hit for Elton John in 1974 and was first released the year before on his famous “Goodbye Yellow Brick Road” album. “Benny” or “Bennie”, that is the question! The spelling “Bennie” was used on the label of the 1973 album’s vinyl disk, but “Benny” was used on the album’s track listing and on the sleeve of the single released the following year.

14 Playful furry swimmer : OTTER

The fur of the sea otter is exceptionally thick. It is the densest fur in the whole animal kingdom.

15 Source of torment : BANE

Today, we tend to use the word “bane” to mean “anathema, a source of persistent annoyance”. A few centuries ago, a bane was a cause of harm or death, perhaps a deadly poison.

17 Fondly remembered moment : CHERISHED MEMORY (a stuffed “CHERRY”)

It is thought that cherry tomatoes were first domesticated in Mexico, having developed from the natural mixing of garden tomatoes with wild, currant-type tomatoes.

21 The whole nine yards : A TO Z

We use the phrase “the whole nine yards” to mean “everything” or “all the way”. It first appeared in an 1855 short story “The Judge’s Big Shirt”. In the story, a judge is pranked by having a massive shirt made for him by a tailor. The prankster feigns innocence saying, “What a silly, stupid woman! I told her to get just enough to make three shirts; instead of making three, she has put the whole nine yards into one shirt!”

23 “Nothing Compares 2 U” singer Sinéad : O’CONNOR

Sinéad O’Connor was a singer-songwriter from Dublin, and a somewhat outspoken and controversial character. My sister-in-law was in the same class as her in high school, and she tells me that Sinéad stood out among her peers even back then.

26 Summer in Saint-Étienne : ETE

The city of Saint-Étienne is the capital of the Loire department in France. The city is home to the extremely successful soccer team AS Saint-Étienne.

28 More miffed : SORER

To miff is to put out, to tee off. “To miff” is a verb that has been around since the early 1600s. In 1824, Sir Walter Scott described the word “miffed” as “a women’s phrase”. That should get him a slap, I’d say …

30 Netflix’s “The Crown,” for one : ROYAL DRAMA (a stuffed “ROMA”)

“The Crown” is a historical drama produced for Netflix that covers the life of British Queen Elizabeth II from her marriage to Philip, Duke of Edinburgh. For the first two seasons, Elizabeth is played by Claire Foy and Philip by Matt Smith. For the next two seasons, Olivia Colman and Tobias Menzies take over as Elizabeth and Philip. The show finishes up with Imelda Staunton and Jonathan Pryce in the roles.

The Roma tomato isn’t considered an heirloom variety but it is very popular with home gardeners, especially those gardeners that don’t have a lot of space. It is a bush type (as opposed to vine type) and needs very little room to provide a lot of tomatoes.

34 Noshes : EATS

Our word “nosh” has been around since the late fifties, when it was imported from the Yiddish word “nashn” meaning “to nibble”. We use “nosh” as a noun that means “snack”, or as a verb meaning “to eat between meals”.

39 North Pole worker : ELF

If you want to send a note to Santa from Canada, he has his own special postal code: “North Pole, HOH OHO”. The US Postal Service suggests that we send mail for Santa to zip code 99705, which directs it to the city of North Pole, Alaska.

40 Egyptian peninsula : SINAI

The Sinai Peninsula is in the eastern part of Egypt, and is a triangular landform bounded by the Mediterranean to the north and the Red Sea to the south. It is the only part of Egypt that lies in Asia as opposed to Africa. The eastern land border of the peninsula is shared with Israel, and Israel occupied the Sinai during the 1956 Suez Crisis and the Six-Day War of 1967.

41 Internet phenomenon : MEME

A meme (from “mineme”) is a cultural practice or idea that is passed on verbally or by repetition from one person to another. The term lends itself very well to the online world where links, emails, files etc. are so easily propagated.

42 Pretend to be asleep : PLAY POSSUM (a stuffed “PLUM”)

The idiom “playing possum” means “pretending to be dead”. The phrase is used in recognition of the behavior of the Virginia Opossum that does just that, plays dead as a defense mechanism. We often use the term “possum” colloquially for the opossum species that live here in North America, but in fact, the true “possums” are marsupials native to Australia.

Plum tomatoes are named for their oval or cylindrical shape. They are often the tomato used for making tomato paste as they have a higher solid content than standard round tomatoes.

44 Sci-fi robot : DROID

“Droid” is short for “android” and is used to describe a robot that resembles a human. The Latin word “androides” was used in English in the 18th century to mean “like a man”. Science fiction writers introduced us to “android” in the early 1950s.

46 Reuben bread : RYE

There are conflicting stories about the origin of the Reuben sandwich. One such story is that it was invented around 1914 by Arnold Reuben, an immigrant from Germany who owned Reuben’s Deli in New York.

50 Winter hrs. in Boston : EST

Boston is the capital of the state of Massachusetts. The city was founded by Puritan colonists from England in 1630. The city takes its name from Boston, England from where several of the early Puritan settlers hailed.

55 Arouses, as curiosity : PIQUES

The words “whet” and “pique” can both be used in the sense of sharpening, or awakening one’s interest or desire.

58 Volcano opening? : VEE

The opening letter of the word “volcano” is a letter V (vee).

62 Hodgepodge : OLIO

“Hochepot” is an Old French word for stew or soup, and this gave rise to an Anglo-French legal term for a collection of property that was gathered prior to being divided up. This became our “hodgepodge” in the early 1400s.

65 Rx orders : MEDS

There seems to be some uncertainty about the origin of the symbol “Rx” that’s used for a medical prescription. One explanation is that it comes from the astrological sign for Jupiter, a symbol put on prescriptions in days of old to invoke Jupiter’s blessing to help a patient recover.

Down

1 Young wallaby in a Nickelodeon animated series : ROCKO

“Rocko’s Modern Life” is an animated sitcom about a wallaby named Rocko that immigrated to America from Australia.

3 Courtroom fig. with a keyboard : STENO

Stenography is the process of writing in shorthand. The term comes from the Greek “steno” (narrow) and “graphe” (writing). A stenographer might be a court reporter, or a person provided captions accompanying a live television broadcast.

7 Legendary folk singer Joan : BAEZ

Joan Baez is an American folk singer and a prominent activist in the fields of non-violence, civil rights, human rights and environmental protection. Baez has dated some high-profile figures in her life including Bob Dylan, Steve Jobs (of Apple) and Mickey Hart of the Grateful Dead.

9 Deep-fried Japanese dish : TEMPURA

Tempura is a style of Japanese cuisine that features seafood, meat and vegetables that have been deep-fried in batter. The use of batter in fried foods was introduced into Japan by the Portuguese in the late 1500s.

10 Jazz sessions : JAMS

The use of “jam”, meaning an improvised passage performed by a whole jazz band, dates back to the late twenties. This gave rise to “jam session”, a term used a few years later. The use of “jam” in this context probably stems from the meaning of “jam” as something sweet, something excellent.

12 Medium’s medium : TAROT

Tarot cards have been around since the mid-1400s, and for centuries were simply used for entertainment as a game. It has only been since the late 1800s that the cards have been used by fortune tellers to predict the future. The list of tarot cards includes the Wheel of Fortune, the Hanged Man and the Lovers.

18 Didn’t ask for a card in blackjack : STOOD

“Stand” and “hit me” are instructions to the dealer in the card game Blackjack. The instruction “stand” means “I don’t want any more cards, I’ll use these”. The instruction “hit me” means “please deal me another card”.

19 Limerick’s land : EIRE

Limerick is the fourth-most populous city in Ireland, after Dublin, Belfast and Cork. It is located on the Shannon Estuary, in the west of the country.

28 Waldorf __ : SALAD

As one might expect, the Waldorf salad was created at the Waldorf Hotel in New York City (now the Waldorf=Astoria), back in the 1890s. The classic version of the Waldorf salad is made from apples, celery and walnuts dressed in mayonnaise and served on a bed of lettuce. Anyone who is a fan of the BBC sitcom “Fawlty Towers” will remember how much trouble Basil Fawlty had coming up with a Waldorf salad for an American guest, as the kitchen was “out of Waldorfs” …

29 “Stranger Things” actor Paul : REISER

The comedian and actor Paul Reiser is best known for co-starring alongside Helen Hunt in the nineties sitcom “Mad About You”. Reiser also co-wrote the show’s theme song, “The Final Frontier”.

“Stranger Things” is a sci-fi horror TV show made for Netflix that aired its first season in 2016. I don’t do horror, and so haven’t seen it …

30 Los Angeles footballer : RAM

The Los Angeles Rams are the only franchise to have won NFL championships in three different cities, i.e. Cleveland (1945), Los Angeles (1951 & 2021) and St. Louis (1999). The Rams were based in Cleveland from 1936 to 1945, in Los Angeles from 1946 to 1994, in St. Louis from 1995 to 2015, and returned to Los Angeles in 2016.

35 FAQ entry : ANS

Most websites have a page listing answers to Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs). Even this blog has one!

37 __ card: smartphone insert : SIM

Most cell phones have SIM cards these days. SIM cards hold the personal information of the subscriber, with the acronym being short for “Subscriber Identity Module”.

43 Light refractor : PRISM

When light passes through a prism, it splits up (disperses) into differing wavelengths. It then becomes clear that white light is actually a mixture of different colors, which show up as a beautiful spectrum.

45 Snorkeling spot : REEF

Our word “snorkel” comes from German navy slang “Schnorchel” meaning “nose, snout”. The German slang was applied to an air-shaft used for submarines, due to its resemblance to a nose, in that air passed through it and it made a “snoring” sound. “Schnorchel” comes from “Schnarchen”, the German for “snore”.

47 English derby town : EPSOM

The Surrey town of Epsom in England is most famous for its racecourse (Epsom Downs), at which the Epsom Derby is run every year, one of the three races that make up the English Triple Crown. We also come across “Epsom salts” from time to time. Epsom salt is magnesium sulfate, originally prepared by boiling down mineral waters. Epsom was indeed a spa town at one time. The town is also home to Epsom College, an English “public school” (which actually means “private, and expensive”). One of Epsom’s “old boys” was the Hollywood actor Stewart Granger.

49 Underwater ink squirter : SQUID

Octopodes and squid have the ability to release a dark pigment into the water as a means of escape. The dark pigment is called cephalopod ink (the squid and octopus belong to the class cephalopoda) and is stored in an ink sac. The dark color is created by melanin, the same substance that acts as a pigment in human skin.

51 Fallingwater architect Frank __ Wright : LLOYD

The architect Frank Lloyd Wright embraced the philosophy of designing structures that were in harmony with the environment. One of his most famous works is an elaborate home in rural Pennsylvania known as Fallingwater, which is partially built over a waterfall.

53 “Superman” actor Christopher : REEVE

Actor Christopher Reeve was most associated with his portrayal of Superman in the late seventies and early eighties. Reeve became paralyzed from the neck down when he fell from a horse in a jumping event in 1995. He published a best-selling autobiography 1999 called “Still Me”, and sadly passed away in 2004.

60 “What’s up, __?” : DOC

Bugs Bunny first said “What’s up, Doc?” in the 1940 cartoon short “A Wild Hare”, while addressing the hunter Elmer Fudd.

61 __ chi: martial art : TAI

More correctly called “t‘ai chi ch‘uan”, tai chi is a martial art that is mostly practiced to improve overall health and increase longevity.