Springs
Looking for Tuesday Strands tips, spangram and answers? You can find them here:
It’s Wednesday, which means we’re halfway through the week, unless it’s morning, which would be 2/5 instead. But spending time with the new Strands puzzle, which has a word that has stumped me the most in my entire time playing.
How to play Strands
The New York Times Springs puzzle is a classic word search game. It’s still in beta, which means it’ll only stick around if enough people play it every day.
There’s a new game Springs play every day. The game presents you with a six by eight grid of letters. The goal is to find a group of words that have something in common and you will get a clue as to what the topic is. When you find a topic, the topic will remain highlighted in blue.
You will also need to find a special word called a spangram. This will tell you what the words have in common. A spangram joins two opposite sides of the board. While the topic words will not be a proper noun, a spangram can be a proper noun. When you find a spangram, it will remain highlighted in yellow.
Each letter is used once in one of the theme words and the spangram. You can connect letters vertically, horizontally and diagonally, and it is possible to switch directions in the middle of a word. If you’re playing on a touch screen, double-tap the last letter to submit your guess.
If you find three valid words containing at least four letters that are not part of the theme, you will unlock the Help button. Click this to highlight the letters that make up one of the theme words.
Be warned: You’ll have to be on your toes. Sometimes you will need to fill in the missing word(s) in a phrase. On other days, the game may revolve around synonyms or homophones. The difficulty will vary from day to day and the puzzle makers will try to surprise you at times.
What is today’s spring tip?
We’ll start with the official NYT help for the day and then I’ll create one of my own. The topic here is not the hardest this time:
Home grown
And my tip:
Spice
That should definitely get you on the right track, I think.
What are today’s answers?
Scroll slowly! This is where the spoilers begin, first with the spangram and then the full list of words that make up the rest of the puzzle. The spangram is:
HERBGARDEN
And this is how it fits on the board:
Springs
Here are the rest of the answers:
BASIL
ROSEMARY
PARSLEY
SAGE
THYME
CORIANDER
RIVET
Ok and first of all….what is CORIANDER??? I’ve never been so stumped for a word. I googled herbs, tried a letter expander, almost asked my Twitter followers. My chef colleague Erik had to fill me in, but I really had never heard of this thing in my life, which caused a huge problem. Easily the most stumped I’ve ever been on a single word in a puzzle like this.
If you don’t know either, cilantro is:
“Seeds that come from the Coriandrum sativum plant. Outside the US, cilantro refers to the leaves and stems of the Coriandrum sativum plant, and the seeds are called coriander seeds. Coriander seeds are round with a beige color and a sweet-spicy flavor profile. Coriander seeds can be purchased whole or ground and are often used in pickles and in many Indian cuisines.
So yes, the more you know. The rest was easy, I’m not a complete idiot, I know what sage and THYME are. But yes, it was hard.
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