My sympathies to Lucy Mangan after she “sliced half the ball of [her] thumb off with the mandolin” (Digested week, 9 January). I fear that mandolin injuries may amount to a significant drain on the NHS. A few years back, I was in an A&E queue, having mandolined off my thumb tip. The chap behind me had done exactly the same thing, though, unlike me, he had brought along the severed tip in a shopping bag, on ice. (My wife later thought she’d found my thumb tip in the sink. It turned out to be a shred of spring onion and, alas, not suitable for grafting.)
Joel Donovan
London
• I have immense sympathy for Lucy Mangan and her mandolin-mangled finger. After several bloody fingertip-shaving incidents, I realised that I could only safely use the device while wearing a butcher’s chain-mail glove on the active hand.
Ian Simmons
Westcliff-on-Sea, Essex
