by Jessie Bullock & Ross Trudeau
[.puz][PDF][Solution] š¤“š¼šøš¼š
There are any number of good reasons to stay active. Heart health. Endorphins. Staying fit for the sport that brings you mental cookies.
Jessie and I? We exercise to accommodate all the rich food and drink that has come to be our regular reward for being good reclusive quarantiners. And reader, we are getting *pro* at date night.
Itās usually a Saturday. We scrub down, dress up, fire up the tea candles and the string lights, and treat ourselves to takeout from one of several excellent options here in Cambridge. There are charcuterie boards. There are elaborate summer cocktails. There are in-season vegetables and cheese and uhhnnnnā¦ Jessie knows how to pick wine.
This weekās puzzle is an homage to eating like royalty when eating is, well, sort of all youāve got. (What am I talking about? I have a life partner who *makes crossword puzzles* with me. I burn! I pine! I perish!)
More on āRoyal Tasterā after the eat-eat-squat jump.
The idea for this puzzle coalesced when I noticed a potential theme pattern that didnāt actually make it into the final draft. The 11th Earl of Sandwich, shrewd businessman that he is, apparently is licensing his name and title toāyou guessed itāa sandwich chain called EARL OF SANDWICH (14). Jessie and I dropped into one somewhere on I95 in New Jersey (in the beforetimes), and I had immediate questions about copyright thatā¦ well, were answered to my delight and satisfaction by their wiki page.
Immediately BURGER KING (10) popped into my head, and DAIRY QUEEN (10) came to us after that. Weāre off and running! But the theme set felt very much like it needed a revealer, and greedy theme seekers that we are, we were hoping for a 4th example of the pattern.
When JACK IN THE BOX (12) presented itself, we rejoiced and then despaired, since JACK isnāt a title of nobility in the same way that QUEEN, KING, and EARL are. A JACK is simply a member of the same courtāWAIT! The same COURT? The sameā¦ FOOD COURT?
And lo! A puzzle is born.
Happy eatiāer, solving.
-Ross