By ANNA EDWARDS
A Muslim family who were sold a cheese and onion pasty which mistakenly had meat by Morrisons were then offered them a bottle of champagne as an apology
The blundering supermarket sold the meat product – which is banned in Muslim culture – then apologised by offering them a bottle of alcohol, which they are not allowed to drink.
The devout Khan family was ‘highly insulted’ by Morrisons supermarket over the meat and alcohol double offence to their culture and religion.
The three cheese and onion pasties were bought for little Yousuf Khan, three, from the store on special offer for 57p.
But Yousuf tucked into his favourite pastie before his parents spotted it contained large amounts of non-halal minced beef.
His father rang the branch of Morrisons in Cardiff Bay where the manager apologised – and caused further insult by offering them a free bottle of alcoholic bubbly in compensation.
Angry garage worker Mr Khan, 28, said: ‘It is ridiculous and ignorant of our faith – not just once but twice.
‘Firstly they should be far more careful with how they label their products, especially when it could contain meat.
‘But then it is completely wrong of the manager to then give us champagne when Muslims don’t drink alcohol.
‘I feel highly insulted. I don’t want this happening to any other people who are Muslim.’
Mr Khan and his wife Nadia, 29, of Canton, Cardiff, said he will never shop at Morrisons again after the humiliating blunder.
The pasties were marked down to 19p from their usual price of 85p.
Two of the cheese and onion pasties were correctly labelled – but the third was wrongly labelled instead of saying it was beef.
Mr Khan said: ‘I put it down to human error, everybody makes mistakes.
‘But it didn’t seem like the manager was really paying attention to the real problem.’
Mrs Khan said the pasties were bought for Yousuf and his three older sisters Ruheena, 10, Amara, eight, and Areesa, four.
She said: ‘I put them in the microwave and gave the first one to Yousuf.
‘I heard him moaning a bit and was saying: “It’s not nice”.
‘I looked at the filling and it was brown meat and potato – he’s had a couple of bites by then.’
Mrs Khan said it was an awful insult to be offered alcohol as compensation for the meat blunder.
She said: ‘The duty manager said we could come and have a bottle of wine or champagne on the house.
‘I’m really disappointed in their response – they didn’t really care. They were ignorant and lazy.’
Red-faced Morrisons said they were taking the incident seriously and are looking into the error.
A spokesman said: “Clearly this is not good customer service.
‘We apologise for the mistake and any offence caused to Mr Khan and his family.
‘We take labelling our products very seriously and we are looking into why this particular product was mislabelled.
‘We know we have to be extra careful when labelling meat.
‘We have 11 million people coming to our stores every week and we put this down to human error.
‘As a result of this incident, we will reinforce the training and standards in the store to make sure it doesn’t happen again.’
Morrisons said they are currently in touch with Mr Khan to discuss a more suitable way of compensating his family.
Halal are foods that Muslims are allowed to eat or drink under Islamic Shariah law.
Meat must come from a supplier that uses halal practices. The slaughter should be performed by a Muslim who must start by invoking the name of Allah.
Source: Mail Online
