Deduce #15: The café — the solution

The Deduce puzzle from August 29, 2026, worked through clue by clue: 7 clues, 3 rounds of crossing off, and no guessing anywhere.

The puzzle

Four people — Jonah, Gwen, Cleo and Uma — and three things to work out about each: their drink, pastry and time. The clues only ever rule things out.

1. The one with the croissant is not the one at 1pm.
2. The lemonade drinker is the one with the tart.
3. The cocoa drinker is earlier than Uma.
4. Jonah is the one at 1pm.
5. The water drinker is earlier than Gwen.
6. Gwen is the one at noon.
7. The juice drinker is exactly 3 hours after the one with the brownie.

The walkthrough

A round is one pass over the clues. Each round applies what the last one settled; every step below is an elimination the clues force, in the order a solver would take them.

Round 1

Start with every possibility open, and take the clues in order.

Clue 3, “The cocoa drinker is earlier than Uma”: cocoa comes off Uma; 10am comes off Uma.

Clue 4, “Jonah is the one at 1pm”: 1pm comes off Gwen, Cleo and Uma. That settles it: Jonah is at 1pm.

Clue 5, “The water drinker is earlier than Gwen”: water comes off Jonah and Gwen; 10am comes off Gwen.

Clue 6, “Gwen is the one at noon”: noon comes off Cleo and Uma. That settles it: Gwen is at noon and Uma is at 11am.

Clue 7, “The juice drinker is exactly 3 hours after the one with the brownie”: juice comes off Gwen, Cleo and Uma; brownie comes off Jonah, Gwen and Uma; 11am comes off Cleo. That settles it: Cleo is at 10am.

Round 2

Go back over the clues with the new facts in hand.

Nobody but Jonah can still have juice, so Jonah’s drink is juice.

Nobody but Cleo can still have brownie, so Cleo’s pastry is brownie.

Clue 1, “The one with the croissant is not the one at 1pm”: croissant comes off Jonah.

Clue 2, “The lemonade drinker is the one with the tart”: lemonade comes off Cleo; tart comes off Jonah. That settles it: Jonah’s pastry is bagel.

Clue 3, “The cocoa drinker is earlier than Uma”: cocoa comes off Gwen. That settles it: Gwen’s drink is lemonade.

Round 3

Go back over the clues with the new facts in hand.

Lemonade is Gwen’s, so it comes off Uma. That settles it: Uma’s drink is water.

Water is Uma’s, so it comes off Cleo. That settles it: Cleo’s drink is cocoa.

Bagel is Jonah’s, so it comes off Gwen and Uma.

Clue 2, “The lemonade drinker is the one with the tart”: tart comes off Uma. That settles it: Gwen’s pastry is tart and Uma’s pastry is croissant.

The answer

Previous: Deduce #14 (Fri, Aug 28) · Next: Deduce #16 (Sun, Aug 30)

About Deduce

Deduce is Noggin’s daily logic grid: four people, three things to work out about each, and clues that never hand you an answer. Every puzzle has exactly one solution and can be finished by crossing off alone. How to play Deduce, or play today’s.