It may not be there furlong: restaurant starts selling horse burger for lunch after horsemeat scandal

A total of 27 beef products were analysed by the FSAI with 10 containing horse DNA (Rex Features)

A restaurant in Hertfordshire has started serving a horse burger despite some consumers shunning meat products altogether after the horsemeat scandal.

Josh Gale, head chef of Host restaurant in Bishop's Stortford, said horsemeat itself was not the issue but the origin of the meat and the quality of the ingredients in products.

Gale, speaking to the Caterer and Hotelkeeper magazine, said: “We are just a little local restaurant but we have always prided ourselves on being local and using sustainable fish and using local meats - we just do it because we think it is right. Horse seemed to fit into that. Why are we throwing away meat and then expecting our beef to cost £3 a kilo?”

The horse burger - served with chunky chips, onion rings, salad and horseradish – will cost £7.50 on the lunch menu. Gale said he hoped eventually to find a local supplier.

Another example of entrepreneurial spirit since the horsemeat scandal saw one eBay user attempting to sell a Findus beef lasagne for £70 on the auction website, in a move the Huffington Post compared to Derek 'Del Boy' Trotter in the TV show Only Fools and Horses.

Meanwhile local butchers have experienced a boom in business since the scandal. The controversy erupted after high percentages of horsemeat were found in some processed ready meals. Confidence in butchers, who can trace their meat back to local farmers, has grown with minced beef sales increasing.