A woman cracked her tooth while eating a pizza containing a screw at Pizza Express in Huntingdon.
The screw was found to have come from a dough tray, used to store dough balls to make the pizza bases, following an investigation by Huntingdonshire District Council’s Environmental Health Food Safety team into the incident on April 6 last year.
At Peterborough Magistrates’ Court on Wednesday (March 19), Pizza Express admitting serving unsafe food and failing to keep equipment in good condition to minimised the risk of contaminating foods.
The restaurant was fined £4,000 for each charge as well as £2,889.68 costs and £120 victim surcharge. Pizza Express was also told by magistrates to investigate replacing dough trays with suitable alternatives at all of its restaurants.
Councillor Robin Howe, executive councillor for Healthy and Active Communities, said: “All food businesses have a duty to make sure that the foods they prepare and sell are both safe to eat and not contaminated. As a result of this incident, the company has amended its procedures and carried out refresher training. In addition, the restaurant has replaced the dough trays with more suitable alternatives.”
A Pizza Express spokesman said: “We have rigorous controls in place and set ourselves very high standards for the safety of our food, which is why this is extremely rare. We have apologised to our guest and taken extra measures to prevent this happening again.”
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