A city centre noodle bar in Oxford has been slapped with a low food hygiene rating.

Tse Noodle in Ship Street describes itself as a “high-quality Chinese food in the heart of Oxford city centre from a chef with over 45 years of experience”.

Yet the restaurant just off Cornmarket Street was told that ‘major improvement’ was necessary when assessed by Oxford City Council’s Environmental Health team.

Following their visit on Monday, February 26, inspectors handed the noodle bar a lowly one-out-of-five hygiene rating.

The report states that ‘major improvement’ is necessary concerning the noodle bar’s management of food safety.

Oxford Mail: The bar serves noodles in Oxford (file photo).The bar serves noodles in Oxford (file photo). (Image: Pexels)

This regards having a system in place to ensure that food sold is safe to eat and if there is evidence that staff know about food safety.

It also concerns whether or not the food safety officer has confidence that standards will be maintained in future.

The eatery also fell short with the cleanliness and condition of its facilities and building where improvement was deemed ‘necessary’.

Oxford Mail: The eatery is located on Ship Street in the city centre.The eatery is located on Ship Street in the city centre. (Image: Tse Noodle (Facebook))

This includes having an appropriate layout, ventilation, hand washing facilities and pest control to enable good food hygiene.

Tse Noodle believe that the poor rating is purely because of a problem with their paperwork on the day.

“We couldn’t find the documents when the inspectors came,” said staff member Shuman Tse.

“But the documents are there now and I believe that is why we scored low.”