How egg farmer cracked culinary conundrum

They say that it’s the simplest ideas that make the biggest difference – and if the "Eggsperiment" that took place at Sherborne Girls on Monday to find the perfect egg and soldier is anything to go by they could well be right. Commissioned by the Royal Society of Chemistry and led by Professor Hal Sosabowski from Brighton University, the experiment was carried out in the school’s new £2.5 million science centre by a team of 12 young students intent on cracking a culinary secret that has eluded chefs for centuries.

Within hours of announcing the results of the experiment ("Science proves that Delia Smith was right all along: the perfect boiled egg does take six minutes") the story had gone global – featuring on everything from BBC One’s lunchtime news to The Telegraph, The Sun, The Mirror, Daily Mail online and Huffington Post, to as far afield as The Times of India and Mumbai Mirror. Not only was this cracking news for Sherborne Girls but also for a local farmer who had helped to make the Eggsperiment possible – Blackacre Farm Eggs in North Cheriton, which supplied a selection of different-sized free-range, fresh eggs for the girls to experiment with.

Dan Wood from Blackacre Farm Eggs said: "It has been great to be involved with the Eggsperiment at Sherborne Girls and to see our eggs used in this research. I delivered 15 dozen medium and large free-range eggs for the girls to make their way through and by the sounds of it there weren’t many left over by the end of the experiment. I’m glad I could be instrumental in helping them solve the riddle of the perfect egg and soldiers!"