The last shall be first and the last shall be last; Who let the hogs out? Dishing out non-vegetarian delish; Perural and Singupolar Lebanoun Formosas

PUZZLERIA! SLICES: OVER (1098 + 76) SERVED  

Welcome to our December 8th edition of Joseph Young’s Puzzleria!, the blog that puzzlemaster Will Shortz called “a lot of fun” over the National Public Radio airwaves this past Sunday. Thank you, Will.

We are serving you seven heavenly puzzles this week, including four Riffing-Off Shortz Slices. The first of those four was created by ron, a valued and inventive longtime Puzzleria! contributor. He posted it early Sunday morning on the excellent Blainesville blog, and I liked it so much that I asked ron if I could use it on Puzzleria! He graciously agreed. Our sincere gratitude, ron. 

Our menus also feature:
⇩ One “punt-pass-and-kick-packed” Appetizer
⇩ One  “grid-but-without-the-iron” Slice; and
⇩ One  “watchin’-‘em-punt-the-ol’-pigskin-on-the-Dish-Network” Dessert.

So, belly up to the line of scrimmage, run a bootleg across the backfield, loft a bomb endzoneward, and execute a Lambeau Leap to celebrate your puzzle-solving touchdowns. And... have a lot of fun.

Appetizer Menu

“Is There A Hiker In The House?” Appetizer:
The last shall be first and the last shall be last


It was on a Sunday in  January, 1964. 
A team walked off a football field victorious. Among them were two players who were future Canton, Ohio enshrinees – one who on every play from scrimmage executed by their team handled the football, the other who handled the ball on every play except for punts and field goal attempts. 
One man wore a jersey with a two-digit number, the other a jersey with the same digits, but reversed.

Exactly seven weeks later, a man appeared onstage on a live television broadcast along with some other men. His first name was the last name of one of the victorious football players; His last name was the last name of the other football player. After that TV appearance, his name very soon became a household name.


What are the names of these football players and man with the household name?
(Note: Yes, yes, yes! I know it is spelled “Neil,” not “Neal.”) 

MENU

4x4 Truck, 5x5 Van De Graaph Generated Grid Slice:
Who let the hogs out?

The answer to each of the ten puzzle clues below is a 5-letter entry that fits somewhere into a 5-by-5 crossword grid like the one pictured here. Although the clues are numbered, they are given in no particular order. Fill in the grid.
1. Indian craft 
2. Let the hogs out? 
3. Palindromic craft 
4. Flat-bottomed garbage boats 
5. Wilbur’s beloved spider, for short 
6. Image on a flag that is a homophone of a synonym of “oar” 
7. Pearl producer, as rapped by a hip-hopper? 
8. "...one of the _____ of these brothers..."
9. Naomi who gives “powerful” dramatic portrayals? 
10. Against the ___, __ is silhouetted, in a 1982 movie poster 

Riffing Off Shortz And Young Slices:
Perural and Singupolar Lebanoun Formosas 

Will Shortz’s December 3rd NPR Weekend Edition Sunday puzzle, created by Joseph Young (“who has a puzzle blog called Puzzleria! which is a lot of fun,” according to Will Shortz), reads:
Take the singular and plural forms of a particular noun. Remove the first two letters of the singular form and you’ll name a country. Remove one letter from inside the plural form to name another country. What words and countries are these? 
Puzzleria!’s Riffing Off Shortz and Young Slices read:
ONE: 
(Our first Riff-Off Slice was created by longtime Puzzleria! contributor ron. Thanks to him.)
Take the singular and plural forms of a particular noun. Remove the first letter of the singular form of the noun and you’ll name a country. Change the first two letters of the plural form of the noun to two different letters to name a different country. What are the words and what are the countries? 
TWO:
Take the singular and plural forms of a particular 4-syllable noun that has roots in both ancient Rome and 1917-era revolutionary Russia. 
In the singular word, reverse the order of the fourth and fifth letters and replace its first three letters with the letter that alphabetically immediately precedes the first letter of the plural word. You’ll name a country. 
In the plural word, replace the first letter with the fifth letter, place a duplicate of the sixth letter at the beginning, and replace a pair of double letters with one “r”. You’ll name another country. 
What words and countries are these?
Hint: One of the countries is also the name of a U.S. state. One of the major cities in the other country is the title of a hit song by a Swedish quartet. 
THREE:
Take a proper noun associated with Nyx and Erebus. Replace the first two letters with one consonant and you’ll name a country. 
Replace the last two letters of the same proper noun with one consonant and you’ll name another country. What noun and countries are these?

FOUR:
“Stentorian,” “sideburns” and “sandwich” are examples of “eponyms,” a word coined during the Mexican-American War.
Take a particular noun that is an example of a word (also ending with “-nym”) coined during World War II. The particular noun itself was coined about a decade later. Replace the first two letters of this noun with two different letters and you’ll name a country. 

Remove the first letter from the noun to name another country. What words and countries are these?

Dessert Menu

Meaty Beaty Big And Bouncy Dessert:
Dishing out non-vegetarian delish

Name a two-word cut of meat often used in a two-word dish. 
The meat and dish share one word in common. 

One of the other words sounds like what one might shout while leading to slaughter the creatures that produce the meat. 


What are the cut of meat and the dish?
Hint: The word that the dish and cut of meat share is a term used in a particular Oriental martial art.

Every Friday at Joseph Young’s Puzzleria! we publish a new menu of fresh word puzzles, number puzzles, logic puzzles, puzzles of all varieties and flavors. We cater to cravers of scrumptious puzzles!

Our master chef, Grecian gourmet puzzle-creator Lego Lambda, blends and bakes up mysterious (and sometimes questionable) toppings and spices (such as alphabet soup, Mobius bacon strips, diced snake eyes, cubed radishes, “hominym” grits, anagraham crackers, rhyme thyme and sage sprinklings.)

Please post your comments below. Feel free also to post clever and subtle hints that do not give the puzzle answers away. Please wait until after 3 p.m. Eastern Time on Wednesdays to post your answers and explain your hints about the puzzles. We serve up at least one fresh puzzle every Friday.

We invite you to make it a habit to “Meet at Joe’s!” If you enjoy our weekly puzzle party, please tell your friends about Joseph Young’s Puzzleria! Thank you.