THE MANAGER of a Derby city centre restaurant which scored zero stars in a food hygiene inspection admitted "droppings" had been found – but insisted now it was clean.
The New Water Margin Cantonese Restaurant, in Burton Road, was ordered to make "urgent improvement" by an inspector who turned up announced.
It was the only premises to score the low rating in the latest batch of hygiene scores released by the city council.
Manager Peter Cheung said: "Sometime in August, these people came and said the kitchen is not clean enough. They found some droppings but we got pest control and now it's OK."
He said inspections in May, June and July were fine.
He said: "It's very clean now – they can rescore us soon."
The shock rating comes just months after it received a "Certificate of Excellence" by the review website tripadvisor.co.uk, which ranked it among the best restaurants in Derby.
Seventy customers used the site to rate the restaurant, with 80% saying it was either "excellent" or "very good".
Among the comments was from a female customer, who wrote: "The food is always excellent. Tasty, hot and fresh. We have never had a bad dish from here and would recommend it for all."
The inspector disagreed but the reasons for the rock-bottom rating have not been released.
There was better news for staff at Himalayan Gurkha Restaurant, in nearby Macklin Street. Earlier this year, the restaurant was graded zero after an inspector found mice droppings and scratches.
But following a reinspection in August, the premises has now been graded four out of five.
The latest batch of scores includes 60 premises. Of those, 48% scored five and 27% were rated four. The remaining 25% scored three or less.
Among the places scoring top marks were The Oak and Acorn in Oakwood, The New Bridge Inn in Shelton Lock, city centre restaurant Lola Lo and the YMCA Café in London Road.
