Nine Irish restaurants and take-aways were closed due to food safety breaches in January.

An Eddie Rockets diner and a Spar store were among two of the businesses told to close their doors last month by the Food Safety Authority of Ireland.

While revealing the closure orders, Professor Alan Reilly, Chief Executive of FSAI warned standards cannot slip to a level that consumer health is put at risk.

He said: ” It is not acceptable for any food business to potentially put their customers’ health at risk. Every food business should be striving to meet the high food safety and hygiene standards that the majority of food businesses achieve on a daily basis.

“We’re urging food businesses to make sure that they have a food safety management system in place and that it is consulted on a regular basis and updated, where necessary, to ensure non-compliance issues and breaches of food safety legislation don’t occur.”