A MAN has claimed he almost choked on a metal bolt he found in an Asda meat pie.

Zac Skidmore, 19, from Charminster in Bournemouth, said he bought a pack of four pies from the St Paul's store in August and half-way through eating one a piece lodged in his throat.

Friend Mark Hughes, 48, a carpenter, said: "I walloped him on his back a couple of times and he coughed and something fell out of his mouth and onto the plate.

"We thought it was a lump of gristle but it turned out to be a bolt.

"His face was going red and I thought he was choking."

Mr Skidmore said he took the bolt back to the store where shocked customer services staff sent the bolt and the pie for investigation.

But he later got a letter from Asda that only referred to "soft grey bits" in the pie.

He claims that when he phoned in anger, a customer service advisor said the bolt had been "thrown away".

Mr Skidmore said: "I would have liked some kind of compensation but most of all I would have liked them to acknowledge what had happened."

He said he is filing a county court claim for personal injury and negligence.

An Asda spokesman said: "We have sent the pie off to our technical team for a full investigation to determine what the foreign body is and how it got in there.

"We can't understand how it got there as we have vigorous metal detection processes but we will keep the customer fully informed of the findings."