A zest for flotsam

SIR – I was interested in the report of fruit washed ashore in Shetland (“Pineapples galore for islanders”, August 28).

Just after the war, a ship sank in the North Sea with a cargo of grapefruit. Many were washed up at Skegness, covered in ships’ oil, which kept the sea from penetrating the skin.

People were collecting them on toboggans and, according to my mother, everyone she met had a different method of removing the oil. The favourite was to line the oven with newspaper and then warm gently.

My mother sent a box to my school boarding house, as no one had ever tasted one. It made me very popular. Rosemary Reed Woodhall Spa, Lincolnshire