Spice burger row adjourned

The legal row over the use of the secret recipe for spice burgers has been adjourned to early next month.

Earlier this week Walsh Family Foods Limited secured a number of interim injunctions against one of its former directors Mr Patrick Walsh, St Canices Road, Glasnevin, Dublin 11, who it is claimed has been passing off burgers made by him as their product.

Today at the High Court Mr Justice Patrick McCarthy agreed, on consent from all parties, to discharge all the injunctions against Mr Walsh after being informed that he had agreed to give undertakings on the same terms as the orders secured by the company. The Judge also adjourned the matter to September 9 next.

The injunctions, granted last Tuesday, restrained Mr Walsh from destroying any information or interfering with any of the company's property, in particular any documentation sent by the suppliers of ingredients for the spice burger - National Food Ingredients in Limerick - concerning the recipe for spice burgers.

He is further compelled to return to the defendant any property of the company, in particular any documentation sent to him by National Food Ingredients Ltd in relation to the recipe for the spice burger.

The orders also restrain Mr Walsh deleting or destroying any confidential information that relate to any scope of the company's business, acquired during his employment with or in his capacity as a director of the company.

On Tuesday Marcus Dowling Bl for the company said that injunctions were being sought at this stage in order to ensure that Mr Walsh does not delete an e-mail, containing details of the spice mix, that was sent by the firm that supplies the ingredients for spice burgers, and the paper trail whereby he passed on the recipe to third parties.

The e-mail, the court heard, was sent last April at a time when it was known that the company was in financial trouble.

Counsel said that Mr Walsh, the son of Maurice Walsh who is credited with having invented the spice burger, is one of the few people who knows the fast foot product's secret recipe.