Rare duck, a 12C fridge and ants: 12 Putney food businesses rated 2 or lower

Thirteen food businesses in Putney are rated 2 or lower out of five for hygiene. At one, a French brasserie, an inspector found duck being served rare.

A 2 means improvement is necessary and a 1 that major improvement is necessary. The 13 are spread across Putney, from Roehampton to Wandsworth Town, and one of them is rated 0, meaning improvement is urgent.

Inspectors score three things: how food is handled, the state of the premises and how well food safety is managed, and the worst of the three sets the ceiling on the rating.

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The brasserie is Gazette on Upper Richmond Road, rated 1 in June. Its burgers were routinely served less than thoroughly cooked, without the safety controls that requires, and there was no hot water at the basin in the women’s toilets, which staff and diners share.

“At the time of my inspection, duck was served pink and when asked the chef did not confirm the time/temperature requirement for cooking duck,” according to the official report, obtained by Putney.news. Poultry can carry bacteria right through the meat, the council’s letter to the restaurant explains, so it has to be cooked through.

At the Garratt Tavern, a pub on the main road leading into Wandsworth, the inspector found mouse droppings in January and warned: “you must ensure that pest activity is eliminated immediately as you risk business closure.” The problem had been going on for some time, according to the report. “I am concerned,” noted the inspector. It is rated 2.

Wandsworth Council provided the inspection reports for eight of the 13, and for three businesses that have since improved or stopped trading, this week under the Freedom of Information Act. We asked for every business scoring 2 and under in the Putney constituency. The rating goes from 0 to 5.

Six of the 11 had no hot water at a hand basin or sink. Eight had no working food safety plan: the written checks on cooking, cooling, cleaning and fridge temperatures that every food business must keep. The Food Standards Agency, which runs the rating scheme with councils, offers a ready-made one free of charge.

For five of the nine still trading, including Gazette and the Garratt Tavern, the council supplied no record of any visit since the inspection. Three others were visited again and had fixed most or all of their problems, but are still rated 1: a new rating comes only at the next planned inspection, or sooner if a business asks, and pays, for a re-rating visit.

There is some good news. We revealed in May that Putney’s Odeon cinema was rated 1 due to a persistent rat problem and poor efforts by management to fix it. The cinema was still displaying its previous ‘5’ rating on the door. Since then, the cinema has upped its game, applied for a re-inspection and last month received a top ‘5’ rating. So no more rustling while watching the film.

Place by place

Gazette, Upper Richmond Road. Rated 1 in June. As well as the duck and burgers, vacuum-packed food from the company’s central kitchen arrived not properly sealed, and staff were not leaving sanitiser on surfaces long enough to work. The inspector recorded that Gazette did have a written food safety plan in place. The council’s letter told the restaurant its rating was 2, but the scores in it add up to 50, which the council’s own table puts at 1, and 1 is what the national register shows. No later visit is on file.

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The Garratt Tavern, Garratt Lane. Rated 2 in January. The pub was told to act on every recommendation from its pest controllers and to call them in more often until the site was declared free of pests, and to cover all food in its freezer. No later visit is on file.

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Nub’s Thai Kitchen at the Hop Pole, Putney Bridge Road. Rated 1 in January. The kitchen had no working food safety plan and no hot water at its basin, and staff “were not seen washing their hands”. Staff told the inspector that cooked food was left to cool on top of the freezer, for about five hours. There was no allergy information for the dishes. By a follow-up visit in February the basin had hot water, a plan and an allergen chart were in place and cleaning had improved. It is still rated 1.

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Rio’s Piri Piri, Putney Hill. Rated 2 in April. The only food safety manual on site belonged to another branch, on Upper Tooting Road, and had not been filled in. The kitchen hand basin was blocked by equipment with nothing to dry hands on, and smoke had built up in the kitchen. The letter setting out Rio’s rating was not among the documents released. No later visit is on file.

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Sweet Tooth Cafe, Upper Richmond Road. Rated 1 in September 2025. There was no separate basin for washing hands in the kitchen, and staff told the inspector they washed their hands in the bathroom. The ventilation was built from plastic ducting stained with grease, which the council said it would report to the fire brigade as a fire risk, and raw chicken was kept above vegetables in the fridge. Twenty-five days later the cafe had a new ventilation system and a completed food safety pack, and the inspector found most problems fixed, asking it to deal with the rest, especially a kitchen hand basin. It is still rated 1.

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Rockingham Food and Wine, Rockingham Close, Roehampton. Rated 1 in June. The fridge of raw and ready-to-eat food was at 12C, when the legal limit for such food is 8C, and the three freezers were at -11C, warm enough for frozen food inside to have started to defrost. The hot water had been turned off. Eggs sat on the shop floor under shelves of cleaning products, drinks were stored in open packaging on the floor of the staff toilet, and ants were living in broken plasterboard under the slushie machine. Food past its use-by and best-before dates was on sale. Some of the problems, the inspector noted, had been raised at a previous inspection. No later visit is on file.

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Michaels Convenience Store, Allfarthing Lane. Rated 1 in October 2025. Food was kept in the lobby directly outside the toilet and there was no hot water at the staff toilet basin. The shop was told, “as previously advised”, to download and complete the free food safety pack for shops. No later visit is on file.

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Wandsworth Premier, Wandsworth High Street. Rated 1 in November 2025. Its food handling scored perfectly; no hot water at the hand basin and no written food safety plan set the rating. At a follow-up visit in April the inspector found “no issues”. The part of that form where a score would go has been blacked out in the copy released, and the register still shows 1.

The cinemas

Odeon, Putney High Street. Rated 1 in March after inspectors lost confidence in its management, following more than a year of customer complaints about mice in the screens. It was rated 5 in August, with top marks for food handling and management.

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Cineworld, Southside, Wandsworth. Rated 2 after a reader reported mouse droppings in a screen in January and inspectors found an infestation that had been running for months, with pest-proofing incomplete, including in the screen rooms. It was rated 4 in June.

Putney’s Odeon cinema has a rat problem. Now it’s official

Since improved or closed

Morley’s, Roehampton High Street. Rated 2 in August 2024, when it was told not to store food that had been in contact with raw meat on the same shelf as ready-to-eat food. Re-inspected in May this year, it now holds a 4, though that report asked for repairs to the roof over its yard, which needed extra supports because it looked as if it might collapse. It won its late-night licence in June.

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Takeaway, 122 Wandsworth High Street. Rated 1 on 1 July, after the inspector found a mouse dropping on a light switch in the preparation area and “a lot of dead insects in the electric fly killer”. The council says that business has stopped trading there and a new one started on 27 July. The register now shows the address as awaiting inspection, and the 1 no longer appears.

Anwar Trading, Merton Road. Rated 1 in October 2025, with no hot water at its sinks. It closed seven weeks later, the council says.

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Wandsworth’s zero-rated bakery

Lockdown Bakehouse, Ferrier Street. The only business in the constituency rated 0, meaning urgent improvement is necessary, is the Wandsworth café of Lockdown Bakehouse, near Wandsworth Town station. The family-run bakery began during the 2020 lockdown and now runs cafés across south-west London.

The Ferrier Street café was rated on 11 August, scoring near the bottom for food handling and for management, and as badly as possible for the state of its premises. It scored 20 for food handling, 25 for the premises and 20 for management. On the council’s own table, 25 is the worst possible score for premises; 20 is the second-worst for food handling and for management.

The chain’s café on Garratt Lane in Earlsfield was rated 5 later the same month, demonstrating just how localised food safety issues are.

Also rated 2 or lower

The register lists four more businesses in the constituency, all inspected in August, whose reports were not part of this request, each rated 1: Cha Thai Story, Old York Road; Costcutters, Upper Richmond Road; Putney Express, Putney Bridge Road; and Winchester House, Lower Richmond Road.

Check before you go

Check any food business on the Food Standards Agency’s ratings website. You can search by name, street or postcode, and the date of the last inspection is shown.

Ask for the report behind any rating. Inspection reports can be requested from Wandsworth Council under the Freedom of Information Act.

Report a food hygiene concern to the team that inspects for Wandsworth, the Regulatory Services Partnership: foodandsafety@merton.gov.uk or 020 8545 3025.