T | R | A | P | S | H | I | P | O | S | L | O | |||
U | H | U | R | A | P | I | N | E | R | E | A | D | ||
R | E | N | A | L | A | P | P | L | E | G | A | T | E | |
S | E | A | G | O | D | P | E | T | N | A | M | E | S | |
A | U | T | O | M | A | T | O | N | O | N | O | |||
N | A | D | A | S | L | I | N | G | S | |||||
P | D | F | S | A | L | E | C | A | S | K | E | T | ||
H | E | A | T | A | C | H | O | O | M | E | N | U | ||
E | C | L | A | I | R | S | N | U | B | Y | E | N | ||
W | A | L | L | S | T | T | T | O | P | |||||
S | K | A | L | I | V | E | D | A | T | E | S | |||
I | C | H | E | A | T | E | D | D | E | J | A | V | U | |
F | O | O | D | C | H | A | I | N | G | A | M | E | D | |
S | O | R | T | A | C | N | E | A | M | E | N | S | ||
O | T | T | O | W | H | A | T | S | A | S | S |
I'm not exactly sure when I came up with this theme idea, but the term FOOD CHAIN pops up a lot in my life: both because I'm an ecologist and because I do food justice-related organizing in my community.
I had no special strategy for creating the FOOD CHAIN in this puzzle. I would just start with a food and see how far I could take it. This probably wasn't the most efficient method, but it was made easier by referring to alphabetized lists of foods (which can be found on a surprisingly high number of websites).
I'm pretty happy with the final set of theme answers. I'm glad all the foods are fairly well hidden. My only complaint is that DATES is plural while all the other foods are singular. I originally had LIVE STOCK, but the editors felt STOCK wasn't a substantive enough food. Luckily, I found LIVE DATES as a replacement, which I think is a more fun answer anyway.
My payment for this puzzle is being donated to The Okra Project.