A MAN was left stunned after finding a piece of glass in a portion of chips he bought from a shop in Pokesdown.

Richard Bath, who lives in Christchurch, was in the area visiting friends on Thursday evening when he purchased a £1.50 bag of chips from Smithsons Fish and Chips on Seabourne Road.

The 21-year-old said he took the takeaway back to his friend’s house to eat the chips before quickly realising something was wrong.

“I was about five or six chips in when I had one in my mouth that seemed to be particularly crunchy,” he said.

“I was literally about to swallow when I took the hard part out of my mouth – only to find it was actually a piece of glass.

“It was quite sharp looking and embedded into the chip – it was about the diameter of a pea and quite flat.

“I have no idea how it could have got there. I couldn’t believe it – so I took a photo of it before taking the chips back to Smithsons to let them know what had happened.”

Mr Bath claims staff at Smithsons refunded the £1.50 but did not apologise or offer an explanation.

“When I went to take them back they seemed really eager to take the glass back,” added Mr Bath.

“After they took it from me they offered to give me another portion of chips, but there is absolutely no way I would risk buying them from there again.”

Joe Yagiz, whose father owns the fish and chip shop, said the piece of glass had broken off the hot plate earlier that day.

He said: “We had taken out the glass from the hot plate to wash it, which we do every day, and a piece of glass broke off.

“We thought we had got it all out but there must have been a piece in the fryer.”

Mr Yagiz said his father did apologise to Mr Bath and offered him a refund.

He added: “We have been here for ten years and nothing like this has ever happened before.”