Posted: December 4th, 2008 - 10:17pm by Doug Powell

DNA fingerprinting is awesome.

It takes the ambiguity out of parenthood, crime, and skin and fingernails in salad.

A customer was eating at Pizza Express in West Wickham High Street when she bit into something hard and chewy.

She removed it from her mouth and found something resembling a piece of human skin with part of a nail attached.

DNA testing linked the half-inch piece of skin to the restaurant’s chef, Nicalau Vandley, who had cut his finger while chopping red peppers two days before the salad was served on January 1 this year.

Pizza Express admitted selling food unfit for human consumption and was fined £7,500 at Bromley Magistrates’ Court December 3.

How exactly the skin ended up in the salad is not known.