Chinese restaurant shut after mouse is found swimming in the sweet and sour sauce

Health inspectors saw a mouse swimming in a portion of sweet and sour sauce about to be served to customers during an inspection of a Chinese restaurant. They photographed the rodent as it jumped out of the bowl and scampered along a draining pipe in the kitchen of the Kam Tong restaurant.

But there were more shocks in store for them in the Kam Tong and two other restaurants, the Hung Tao and Kiasu, all owned by Ronald Lim in Queensway, Bayswater. They were crawling with cockroaches whose eggs were found in the dim sum and baskets of prawn crackers. Mice droppings were found all over the kitchens including inside the fridges and on crockery, soy sauce containers and a chopping board next to some meat.

The hygiene was so appalling that the ventilation canopy in one of the restaurants was “oozing with grease”, Southwark crown court heard. Lim was arrested and admitted 17 counts of breaching food hygiene regulations. Judge Geoffrey Rivlin, QC, said the conditions that environmental officers from Westminster council found were “disgraceful” and branded them an “appalling risk” to the safety of customers.

He said: “Thankfully there is no evidence before me of actual illness being suffered by your customers.” Lim, of Barnet, was given an eight-month jail term suspended for two years. He was also ordered to pay fines totaling £30,000 plus £18,131 costs. The judge said if he had not pleaded guilty he would have gone to prison immediately.