It may be called the Fortune Cookie, but a Chinese takeaway failed to live up to its name when it was fined £1,000 for poor hygiene standards.
The takeaway, in Kingston Road, Ewell, was prosecuted by Epsom Council following a food hygiene inspection by its environmental health officers last year.
It found that the owner, Chun Gen Zheng, had failed to devise a documented food safety management system - a legal requirement to ensure food safety is maintained at the premises, for which he was served a food hygiene improvement notice.
But when inspectors called at the takeaway again following the expiry of the notice, they found that there was still no food safety management system in place.
Mr Zheng pleaded guilty on January 7, at South East Surrey Magistrates’ Court, to failing to comply with the notice.
He was fined £1,000, ordered to pay £300 in costs to the council and a £100 victim surcharge. The magistrates took into account his early guilty plea.
Councillor Jean Steer, chairman of the council’s social committee, said: "A documented food safety management system is fundamental to the safe operation of a food business and is not difficult or expensive to put in place.
"Environmental health officers at Epsom and Ewell Borough Council will always do what they can to support businesses - indeed they spend the majority of their time giving advice to food businesses to help them improve food safety and to comply with food safety regulations.
"However, when a business ignores the advice given to them, and there is a risk that consumers are being put at risk, the council will not hesitate to step in to protect the public."
No one was available for comment at the Fortune Cookie when contacted by the Epsom Guardian.
Epsom Council inspects all food businesses within the borough and allocate a food hygiene rating, from zero, where urgent improvement is necessary, to five which is ‘very good’.
Following an inspection last August the Fortune Cookie received a score of one - major improvement necessary.
The public can check these ratings before they purchase takeaway food or eat out on the Government’s Food Standards Agency.
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