THE husband and wife team behind a popular family-run food stall were "absolutely delighted" to find out they had turned around a low food hygiene score.

Earlier this year Taste Tibet was given a one-star food hygiene rating after council bosses said it had become too successful to continue operating as it was from the couple's family kitchen.

Julie Kleeman and Yeshi Jampa made the necessary improvements and were awarded a four-star rating earlier this week.

Ms Kleeman said: "It was a shock for us, we had started the business in a very casual way a few years ago and we cook from home.

"We had no idea how fast the business was going to take off - it's been massively successful.

"There was a lack of understanding on our part that given the size - we have cooked for 600 people at some college balls - there would be additional responsibility and more paperwork.

She added: "We were absolutely delighted with the four star rating, we were aware that we wouldn't return to our five-star rating as to do that we need to find a commercial kitchen, but we are thrilled nonetheless."

"My husband Yeshi has also done his level 3 food hygiene qualification which is above and beyond what he needs which has helped and I also took my level 2."

The popular food stall, which was listed in The Guardian’s top ten budget food options in Oxford in 2014, serves Tibetan momo dumplings (meat or vegetable), curries, soups and home-made flatbreads.

But when Oxford City Council inspectors visited in May they said the couple's kitchen operation was "no longer suitable" for the scale of their operation.

Ms Kleeman, who resigned from her job at Oxford University Press in 2014 to help her Tibetan husband grow the business, said the hunt for new kitchen was very much on.

She said: "This is our quiet season at the moment and we want to use it to find a premises for a commercial kitchen - hopefully in central Oxford.

"We are still looking for somewhere - so if anyone had any ideas or business proposals we would be interesting - but it would only be a kitchen, it works for us to be mobile."

The stall has a regular slot at the Gloucester Green Market every Wednesday and features at a number of food festivals throughout the year.