WSJ (Contest) Grid: 12 minutes; Meta: 20 more 
[4.54 avg; 13 ratings] rate it
Mike Shenk’s Wall Street Journal contest crossword, “Raise a Glass” — Conrad’s writeup
WSJ Contest – 08.10.2025
This week we’re looking for a beverage brand. Mike provided a clue in the bottom center horizontal entry: CLINK (Sound of touching glasses in a toast (and a hint to finding the contest answer). I immediately thought of C-LINK, meaning link the C’s. I had the rabbit: connect the five C’s in the grid. It took me a bit to work out the path, but it locked in when I saw it.
The C’s in the grid LINK to form our contest solution COCA-COLA CLASSIC. Another impressive feat of construction by Mike: I loved it. Solvers: please share your thoughts. I’ll leave you with “a lovely song about alcohol and prostitution.”
This was a very impressive puzzle! In spite of the fact that we didn’t get the correct answer, we were happy with the answers we came up with. We saw COCA coming from the first C and COLA from the second. The third C formed the beginning of COLA when read clockwise around four squares. From there we came up with two possible solutions: because of the extra COLA it could be COCA COLA PLUS (a brand available in Japan) or, since the extra COLA was in the form of a circle, it could be COCA COLA ZERO. We neglected to link the final C but thought it unnecessary because it was in the revealer. The actual answer was an amazing surprise, but we were still satusfied with the process that led us to our answers.
“I immediately thought of C-LINK” ?? That’s pretty amazing.
I thought “in a toast” was going to have some significance. The T_AST in the grid had me stuck for quite a while.
+1
Puzzle: WSJ (Contest); Rating: 4 stars
Got distracted by so many T O A S T squares…thinking maybe a logo was hiding in their pixelated presence. Then the CLINK double entendre clicked.
Fun!
Corn syrup or cane sugar notwithstanding, I’ll stick to the occasional Dr, Pepper.
I knew C-LINK was the key but I looked at all the words with C in them and what links there were to them. I didn’t think of the original C as the starting place, rising up. Very neat construction.
I wonder if the clue for 16A was a subtle hint, CONSERVATIVE COLUMNIST CHAVEN. Those three C’s had me wondering early on.
Same wrong track here, caught the C-LINK hint but never figured out what to do with it, looked at all the C’s in the clues as well as in the grid. Then thought of Hi-C and tried in vain to make that work somehow. Overthinking what should have been an easy one. Nice meta.
Puzzle: WSJ (Contest); Rating: 5 stars
I’ve been at this for five years and Mr Shenk still finds cunning new ways to stump me. Another masterpiece – bravo.
Puzzle: WSJ (Contest); Rating: 5 stars
Nice one!
Puzzle: WSJ (Contest); Rating: 5 stars
Fantastic! This puzzle had my favorite ever clue/answer combo, 3D. The letters for TOAST can be found in the answer, “Its what I do”, though not in order. This distracted me awhile from working on C-LINK, as I didn’t think it could be mere coincidence. In fact, if you read the lettters in column 3 from bottom to top you will see the letters spelling TOAST in order but not consecutively. Unfortunately, I’m easily distracted from the task at hand. Fortunately, my collaborators set me straight regarding the diagonals.
Great puzzle, Mike. Thanks for the fun!
Puzzle: WSJ (Contest); Rating: 4 stars
I spotted COCA COLA CLASSIC in the grid, but I couldn’t figure out how “CLINK” fit into the meta mechanism. Now I get it–very clever!
Puzzle: WSJ (Contest); Rating: 5 stars
Got the COCA COLA, missed CLASSIC.