The flaming chorizo looked appetising until the waiter decided to top up the sausage dish with a dash more rum — then it exploded at a packed table.

The blunder left a woman with horrific burns as she ate with friends at the Sporting Clube de Londres in West London. The victim said that she felt “as if someone had put a flame-thrower to her face”.

Injuries from the ball of fire have led to two skin grafts and she will need to wear pressure garments on her hands for 23 hours a day for the next two years.

Rui Daniel Faria Velosa, the owner of the Portuguese restaurant, was fined yesterday for a series of health and safety offences.

The incident occurred in May 2005 at the restaurant in Elkstone Road, North Kensington, when the waiter got carried away and added more alcohol than the recipe demanded.

The main course, served in a ceramic dish, was already alight when it arrived at the diners’ table. After a short time the waiter returned with more rum and attempted to top up the level in the dish. Instead it spilled over the woman, who cannot be named.

As well as suffering extensive burns to her face and hands, and having to spend two weeks in hospital, she is still suffering from flashbacks, panic attacks, anxiety and depression.

Velosa was fined £4,000 at West London Magistrates’ Court and ordered to pay £2,000 costs.

He admitted not carrying out a suitable and sufficient risk assessment of how to safely serve the dish with the flammable liquid. He also pleaded guilty to not implementing the necessary control measures and failing to report the accident to the local authority.

The prosecution was brought after an investigation by environmental health officers. Fiona Buxton, cabinet member for environmental health at Kensington and Chelsea Council, said: “This was a truly awful accident that should never have happened. The victim’s life has been affected terribly. I hope this fine gets the message across to restaurants that the council will not tolerate any business which does not follow the correct health and safety procedures in the workplace.”

Often used as an ingredient of other dishes, the Iberian chorizo is also served as a main dish cooked over burning spirits.

A spokesman for Tugga, the Portuguese restaurant in King’s Road, West London, said: “We cook it with grappa. It needs to be lightly flambéed and, of course, it is not dangerous. But you need to put in not too much alcohol.”

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