Eating out in West Devon over Christmas? How clean is the restaurant kitchen?

Good food hygiene is getting easier to spot these days with the recent introduction of the National Food Hygiene Rating Scheme – often referred to as Scores on the Doors.

Restaurants, pubs, hotels, as well as cafes, takeaways and other places that sell or serve food, are now being rated from 0 - 5 on their hygiene standards when a food hygiene inspection is carried out by West Devon Borough Council.

A score of 5 shows food hygiene standards on the premises are "very good." A 0 rating indicates "urgent improvement necessary".

It's easy to check out the ratings by looking them up online at: food.gov.uk/ratings.

But you might also spot the distinctive green and black stickers businesses are encouraged to display at their outlets to tell their customers the rating they were given.

Cllr Robert Oxborough, West Devon's chairman of Environment and Community, said: "Schemes like these where local businesses get a score for their performance enable them to benchmark their standards against targets and other competitors and then if needed, make improvements to their services.  This is good for the business and the consumer eating there."

Pete Wearden, who leads West Devon food safety team, said: "The scheme has been a great success and since we adopted it in April this year, there has been a lot of interest shown and many businesses not achieving the highest rating during our inspections have been keen to improve further.  

"Over 90 per cent of businesses inspected so far have achieved a rating of '3' and above and over half achieving the maximum rating of '5'. We seek to work closely with our businesses to assist them to meet legal standards and, in the minority of cases unfortunately, we take formal action so as to protect the consumer."

Catriona Stewart, Head of the Food Hygiene Ratings Team at the FSA added: 'The FHRS is all about putting the consumer first, supplying people with useful information on which to base their choice of where to eat. 

"The FSA is working in partnership with West Devon Borough Council and other localauthorities to introduce this scheme nationally. It means that when you eat out - be it in the area you live or further away - you can easily compare hygiene standards of different food outlets".