Blossom between the skins

“Angus Whitson’s article regarding using gorse blossom to dye Easter eggs brought back memories of my childhood,” emails a Craigie reader. “We would dye Easter eggs by covering them in the dry outer skins of white onions then wrapping and tying them up in newspaper before hard boiling them.

“However we would also place gorse blossom or celandine flowers between the onion skins and the egg to achieve a pretty effect against the onion dye.

“Before we ate the eggs, we would compete to see who had the hardest egg by knocking the ends together and the holder of the final unbroken egg would usually win a mini chocolate egg.”