Green in product names / WED 11-13-13 / Company founded by 17-year-old Swede / Cowardly Lion portrayer / Foofaraw

Constructor: Jean O'Conor

Relative difficulty: Easy


THEME: PESTO (61A: What you get when you blend the results of this puzzle's recipe instructions) — theme answers are instructions for making PESTO

Theme answers:

• 17A: Recipe instruction #1 (MINCE GARLIC)
• 22A: Recipe instruction #2 (GRATE PARMESAN)
• 33A: Recipe instruction #3 (CHOP BASIL LEAVES)
• 45A: Recipe instruction #4 (CRUSH PINE NUTS)
• 53A: Recipe instruction #5 (ADD OLIVE OIL)

Word of the Day: ANITA Diamant (37D: "The Red Tent" author Diamant) —

Anita Diamant (born June 27, 1951) is an American author of fiction and non-fiction books. She is best known for her novel,The Red Tent, a New York Times best seller. She has also written several guides for Jewish people, including The New Jewish Wedding and Living a Jewish Life. (wikipedia)

I'm less annoyed than I am tired. Tired of the onslaught of competent but dull and unambitious puzzles that the NYT is turning out this week. This is a well-meaning effort. It's a recipe. The revealer is … the thing that's being made. Sadly, but unsurprisingly, solving this was about as exciting as reading a PESTO recipe. So straightforward it hurts. ADD OLIVE OIL is weird since the other ingredients a. all involve transformative actions and b. have not yet been combined so technically there's nothing to ADD the OLIVE OIL to. But that's a nit. The bigger problem is the dullness. Also, the fill, which, Once Again, is manifestly, on its surface, obvious for all to see, subpar and crosswordese-laden. I don't really want to do a full list, but multiple OLEARYS, really? Since when? Is that in the song / legend? She has a husband? A family? It's just *her* cow, Mrs. O'LEARY'S cow. If there is a husband / family, who the hell knows that? Oh, look, my friend Amy pointed me to wikipedia, which reveals that Mrs. O'Leary "was married to Patrick O'Leary. The couple's son, James Patrick O'Leary, grew up to run a Chicago gambling hall." So the clue checks out, and yet it's still her damned cow. Hers. Not theirs.


We've also got ERB, OBE, ESTH, ALCAN, ENVIRO (?), MILORD, PIET, LAHR, etc. … only now that I look at it, that list (of xwordese and whatever ENVIRO is) is starting to feel average. Average for a NYT puzzle. A NIP!? Gah. Where is the joy? SPONGEBOB! That works. The rest is just a grind. Also, as a friend of mine just noted to me, re: 46D: Pizza cuts, essentially (RADII)—"that is wrong; nobody cuts a pizza that way." He's right. Birthday cake cuts, sure. Pizza, no.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld