There it was, nestled in the lower-right quadrant of my Saturday puzzle, a seven-letter crossword clue that seemed more at home on a nutrition blog than in my beloved grid:
Keto and Paleo, for two
.
My first thought, as it often is with this kind of clue, was to dive into the specifics. What do these two eating philosophies have in common? Meat, certainly. A distinct lack of bread, for sure. I pictured a plate of grilled steak and broccoli, a meal that would get a thumbs-up from followers of either regimen. But “steak dinner” didn’t fit, and it felt far too literal for a weekend puzzle. This wasn’t a crossword clue about menu planning.
This is the beautiful trap of a well-constructed clue. It sends your brain down a specific, logical path that is, more often than not, the scenic route to nowhere. The constructor wants you to get lost in the weeds of low-carb, high-fat macros and the finer points of Paleolithic eating. They want you to think about what you
can’t
eat—grains, sugar, legumes. But the secret to solving this crossword clue isn’t found in the details of the diets themselves.
The real hint, the flashing neon sign, is in the final two words: “…for two.”
This grammatical flourish is a classic piece of crossword misdirection. It’s a signal to the solver to pull back from the specific examples (Keto, Paleo) and think about them on a much higher, more categorical level. The question isn’t “What is a food that fits both Keto and Paleo?” The real question being asked by this crossword clue is much simpler: “What
are
Keto and Paleo?”
They are two examples of a
type
of thing. The puzzle is asking for the plural noun that describes the category they both belong to. It’s the same logic you’d apply to a crossword clue like “Mars and Venus, for two” or “French and Spanish, for two.” You wouldn’t try to find a shared characteristic of the planets or a word that exists in both languages. You’d identify the category they represent.
Once you make that mental shift, the puzzle’s fog begins to lift. You stop thinking about nutrition and start thinking about classification. This is the “aha!” moment that every solver chases. It’s not about knowing the difference between ketosis and the caveman. It’s about recognizing the structure of the language itself. The puzzle isn’t testing your dietary knowledge; it’s testing your ability to see the forest for the (very low-carb) trees. This particular crossword clue is a perfect lesson in that essential skill. So, take a step back, look at the big picture, and ask yourself again: what, fundamentally, are we talking about here?
Available Answers:
DIETS.
Last seen on the crossword puzzle: 1117-25 NY Times Crossword 17 Nov 25, Monday