The chairman of Wetherspoon has apologised to customers over a steak recall and said it has dropped its meat supplier, Russell Hume.
Sirloin, rump and gammon steak were pulled from the menu of the chain’s 900 UK and Irish pubs on Tuesday after the supplier said there was a “mislabelling” issue.
Wetherspoon said it has cancelled its contract with Russell Hume and is now sourcing its steaks from new suppliers.
Chairman Tim Martin said: “Firstly we wish to apologise to our customers for the inconvenience caused to them.
“However, our decision to stop serving steak from Tuesday January 23, despite limited information from the supplier, was the correct one.
“Steak is one of the most popular dishes on our menu, and we serve around 200,000 per week on average, about half of these on our extremely popular Tuesday Night Steak Club.
“We have now sourced alternative suppliers and our pub staff are once again looking forward to serving the steak dishes from Tuesday January 30 onwards.”
In a statement after the steak recall, Russell Hume, which was also supplying Jamie Oliver and Greene King, said: “The product recall was a precautionary measure because of mislabelling.”
But the Food Standards Agency (FSA) said it was investigating the supplier over “serious non-compliance with food hygiene regulations”.
The FSA said in a statement that, following an unannounced inspection of Russell Hume’s Birmingham site earlier in January, it became aware of the hygiene issues.
The FSA said there was no indication that anyone had become ill from eating Russell Hume meat.