A thought on the variety of making an egg

“The test of a cook is how she boils an egg. My boiled eggs are fantastic, fabulous. Sometimes as hard as a 100 carat diamond, or again soft as a feather bed, or running like a cooling stream, they can also burst like fireworks from their shells and take on the look and rubbery texture of a baby octopus. Never a dull egg, with me.”
— Nancy Mitford

The British novelist Nancy Mitford wrote these words in a letter that was collected posthumously in 1993 in Love From Nancy: The Letters of Nancy Mitford.

Mitford’s somewhat aristocratic family has intrigued people for generations, particularly how six sisters could be so divergent, with two fascists and a communist coming from under the same roof. Nancy Mitford earned her fame not from politics but from her writing; Love in a Cold Climate remains one of her best-known books.

Last year, the British dramatic series Outrageous chronicled the times of the six sisters, which speaks to the appeal of a family with a chaotic history.