Raymond Blanc restaurant banned from serving liver that poisoned diners

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Chef Raymond Blanc's Covent Garden restaurant has been banned from serving a dish of 'undercooked' liver which left two diners with food poisoning.

According to the BBC, Brasserie Blanc is forbidden from offering pink lamb's liver after it ignored Westminster Council's environmental health warning.

Westminster Magistrates' Court was told it posed an 'imminent risk of injury to health'.

62-year-old Blanc is the director of the company which owns the restaurant.

Two diners contracted campylobacter food poisoning after eating the lamb's liver on two separate occasions this summer.

The Brasserie Bar Co. was ordered to pay £3,103 in costs and said it had taken the liver off the menu at all 18 of its Brasserie Blanc restaurants throughout the UK.

The Food Standards Agency recommends cooking lamb's liver at 70 degrees centigrade for at least two minutes.

Westminster City Council's food, health & safety manager, James Armitage, said: 'After receiving two separate complaints of food poisoning which may have originated from eating at a Covent Garden restaurant, our officers investigated and issued a notice which prevented the restaurant from serving undercooked lamb's liver.

'Today's court decision to uphold the notice is welcome as the serving of undercooked meat, without suitable controls in place, is a public health risk.

'Health inspectors have agreed with the restaurant the safety measures that need to be in place for the restaurant to be allowed to safely put the dish back on its menu.'

A restaurant spokeswoman said: 'Brasserie Bar Co. has not contested the environmental health officers' enforcement and will no longer serve liver in any of its restaurants.

'In order to serve liver and comply with Westminster Council, it would need to be overcooked to such an extent that our customers just won't eat it.'

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