Rex Parker in the News Constructor: Andrea Carla Michaels — three familiar two-word names, wherein the first word is a state MINNESOTA FATS (20A: Jackie Gleason's role in "The Hustler") CALIFORNIA ROLLS (38A: Common sushi orders) VIRGINIA SLIMS (58A: Cigarette associated with women's tennis) (47D: Country singer Robbins and others) — Martin David Robinson (September 26, 1925 – December 8, 1982), known professionally as Marty Robbins, was an American singer, songwriter, andmulti-instrumentalist. One of the most popular and successful country and Western singers of his era, for most of his nearly four-decade career, Robbins was rarely far from the country music charts, and several of his songs also became pop hits. So these are things that are named for states? What about NEW YORK DOLLS? Wait, are FATS, ROLLS, and SLIMS part of the theme. FATS and SLIMS have a nice polarity to them, but how does ROLLS factor in? Doesn't seem like it belongs in the middle.

Seems like it belongs on the FATS side. Anyway, the theme seems very loose and very thin. Is the WTA still sponsored by Virginia Slims? That seems messed up. You'd think there'd be enough money and interest in women's tennis at this point that they wouldn't need cigarette money. But maybe that sponsorship has stopped. I haven't seen the "Virginia Slims" name anywhere near the women's tennis matches I've watched lately (not that I remember, anyway). I wonder why we have so much inelegant fill in an easy-to-fill 78-word grid that contains just three theme answers. . . The strange Surely there's a reason. I do like some of this fill, though.  (11D: 1976 Broadway musical with the hit song "Day by Day") and are particularly nice. Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld P.S. here's a mini-version of this theme (sans the confounding ROLLS answer) © Free Blogger TemplatesIt looks like you're using an Ad Blocker. Please consider supporting our site by .Author grids:Peter A. Collins |

Jan 2017 grids | NYT links: Across Lite PDF Regular User $20.00 USD Casual User $10.00 USD XWord Info is only possible when people like you choose to support it through donations. Donate to get access to XWord Info for a year. Benefits vary by donation level. Peter A. Collins notes: I'm sure a few people out there will look at my D-N-As winding down the grid and say 'Hey, that's a single helix, not a ... morePeter A. Collins notes: I'm sure a few people out there will look at my D-N-As winding down the grid and say "Hey, that's a single helix, not a DOUBLE/HELIX!". To them, I'd like to respond with a quote from The Dude in "The Big Lebowski". "Yeah, well, you know, that's just, like, your opinion, man." My defense is that the two sides of the squares containing the Ds, Ns, and As form the double helix. Yeah, I didn't think so. Actually, a few years ago Joe Krozel and I tried to build a grid with intertwining D-N-As working their way down the grid, but soon gave up.

If I recall correctly, the fill around that column got way too tortured. A belated Happy New Year to one and all!Jeff Chen notes: The DOUBLE / HELIX is so ripe for crossword brainstorming. jogos sushi magico sudokuOne of Liz Gorski's a while back was particularly memorable, as was one of ... moreJeff Chen notes: The DOUBLE / HELIX is so ripe for crossword brainstorming. sushi las condes domingoOne of Liz Gorski's a while back was particularly memorable, as was one of Joel Fagliano's. where can i buy sushi grade fish in portlandToday, Pete gives us something similar but goes with the letters D N A filling out the more-single-than-double-looking (sorry, Pete!) helix.sushi rolling mat amazon

Nice find that WATSON / CRICK / DOUBLE / HELIX exhibit crossword symmetry! I did find it inelegant to have to jump across the grid to connect the word pairs, and it was weird to get CRICK before WATSON. Using mirror symmetry would have helped this — both WATSON and DOUBLE could have been in the top half of the puzzle, with CRICK and HELIX at the bottom. (Back to the bottom where you belong, CRICK!) Some nice bonuses in the grid, ARACHNID and ON THE GO my favorites. NOT A SOUL and FOOTSTEP = good stuff too. Much appreciated to get the extras, given that the puzzle felt a bit theme-thin.As a macro econ junkie, I loved seeing REAL GDP in the grid. Except that it was REAL GNP! (Domestic vs. National, don't ask me what the difference is. My macro prof is now rolling in her grave.) That crossing with BRINDISI was a killer. Perhaps a case can be made that it's fair since the Appian Way is very famous, but that didn't stop me from grumbling. It's so tough to work through that center of the puzzle, with so many D N A letters fixed into place.

So the gluey results of INRI, SANI, ENDO, BANOS … not unexpected. And having a theme word fixed into place in each of the four corners, getting more ACOP, TASS, MDLI, ROIS, LIBBER, ERO … again, it's not unexpected, but it doesn't make for an elegant, smooth solve. Finally, as a biochem junkie, I would have loved to see base pairings of A-T and G-C (adenine-thymine and guanine-cytosine), reflecting the actual building blocks of DNA. But I can only imagine thousands of solvers wondering why there were so many of these four letters in the grid. And other thousands in an outcry yelling BUT THAT AT-GC-GC-GC-AT-AT-GC SERIES IS NOT AN ACTUAL GENE SEQUENCE! Can't make everyone happy.But tuna is often frozen, too, not necessarily to make it safe, but because global consumption of sushi continues to rise. Frozen fish usually costs about half as much wholesale as fresh. And some cuts, like the prized fatty toro, are not always available fresh. Naomichi Yasuda, the owner of Sushi Yasuda, the acclaimed sushi restaurant in New York City, said he imported fresh tuna but froze it himself, selling it for $10 a piece.''

American customers don't want to hear that something is out of season'' he said with a shrug. ''People want toro every day.''At the Elizabeth, N.J., warehouse of True World Foods, a manager, Ken Kawauchi, recently readied a room-size freezer to receive eight more tons of premium tuna frozen with sophisticated technology that chefs say preserves the texture and flavor of the fish.''This product is better than fresh,'' he said. ''We start freezing it almost before it's dead.''At 76 degrees below zero, you can feel your hair follicles freeze. A 20-pound chunk of premium bluefin tuna is rock hard and cold enough to burn a blister on your finger.But all it takes is a band saw, 10 minutes and a bowl of warm water to produce deep red, dewy slices of the finest sushi money can buy, the same toro served at Manhattan sushi shrines.Sabine Marangosian, who works in Midtown Manhattan, said she ate sushi ''at least once a week.'' ''I guess I would understand that some sushi is frozen,'' she said. ''But I would hope that's not the case at Nobu.''

But Shin Tsujimura, the sushi chef at Nobu, closer to Wall Street, said he froze his own tuna. ''Even I cannot tell the difference between fresh and frozen in a blind test,'' he said.Even Masa Takayama, whose sushi temple Masa, in the Time Warner Center, charges a minimum of $300 to worship, said he used frozen tuna when fresh is unavailable. Many sushi bars, in Japan and elsewhere, routinely use frozen fish when fresh is unavailable or more expensive than the market will bear.''In Japan,'' Mr. Kawauchi said, ''50 percent of the sushi and sashimi is frozen. Only my American customers are so concerned with fresh fish.''Americans have clearly overcome the initial resistance that greeted sushi when it was widely introduced nationally in the 1980's.The number of Japanese restaurants across the country has steadily increased in the past five years, according to the National Restaurant Association. And that number does not include the supermarkets, delis, cafeterias, and Costco stores where sushi can now be purchased.A.F.C. Sushi, a Los Angeles-based sushi franchiser, has more than 1,800 outlets nationwide.

It already supplies the Staples Center, in Los Angeles; Florida State University, in Tallahassee, Fla.; and the United States military, which buys sushi for its commissaries. Although the company's Web site refers to ''fresh sushi,'' A.F.C. uses only frozen fish in its products.According to wholesalers like Dave Rudie, a pioneering sushi supplier in California who sells both fresh and frozen fish, more and more frozen fish is being served as sushi here.Mr. Rudie said that worldwide, some sushi products are virtually always frozen. ''Ninety percent of shrimp, of course,'' he said, The salmon roe ''and octopus, 99 percent. And you definitely want all your salmon frozen, because of parasites.''The Food and Drug Administration does not enforce the frozen-fish rule, leaving that to local health officials. The agency says sushi fish can be frozen either by the wholesaler or in the restaurant, and each party likes to believe that the other is taking care of it. ''I always assumed that the fish is frozen at some point before I get it,'' said Jack Lamb, owner of Jewel Bako in the East Village in Manhattan, ''but just for a minute, like an X-ray.''

Ian MacGregor, whose wholesale business, Lobster Place, supplies the sushi hot spot Geisha, in Midtown Manhattan, said he had heard countless euphemisms for frozen fish in restaurants. ''Fresh-frozen, re-freshed, flash-chilled, take your pick,'' he said. But ''superfrozen'' fish seems to be in a category by itself. Many top sushi chefs are finding that fish frozen to about 70 degrees below zero, instead of the commercial standard, usually 10 below, can stand up to their rigorous standards.Tuna, one of the most expensive sushi fish in the world, has been the test market for superfreezing.Freezing technology that truly preserves the quality of fresh fish is relatively new, said Eric Graham, managing director of ColdWave Systems, a global seafood shipper.Developed by the Japanese fishing industry in the 1990's to preserve the catch on long trips, superfreezing can reduce the core temperature of a 500-pound tuna to minus 70 degrees in about a day and a half. Packed in artificial snow ground from dry ice and surrounded by liquid nitrogen, that fish can be preserved with no decomposition for as long as two years.''