Three in four rated premises in St Albans district hold five stars. Nineteen hold two or below, and a Harpenden kitchen has held a zero since 9 June.
Of the 1,063 food businesses in St Albans district that carry a hygiene rating, 814 hold the top score of five. That is 77 per cent, and it is the number worth starting with, because the register these figures come from records failure far more readily than it records success.
The Food Standards Agency publishes every rating given by the council’s food safety team. We pulled the whole St Albans City register on 7 September 2026: 1,162 premises, of which 58 are exempt from rating and 41 are new and awaiting their first inspection.
The district, rated
- 5, very good: 814 premises (76.6 per cent of those rated)
- 4, good: 160 (15.1 per cent)
- 3, generally satisfactory: 70 (6.6 per cent)
- 2, improvement necessary: 10 (0.9 per cent)
- 1, major improvement necessary: 8 (0.8 per cent)
- 0, urgent improvement necessary: 1
The one zero is in a retirement scheme in Harpenden
The single zero on the district register belongs to Spud Kingz @ Housing 21, the catering operation at Restaurant Lea Springs, 14 Lower Luton Road, Harpenden AL5 5FA. It was rated 0, urgent improvement necessary, on 9 June 2026, and the register classes it as caring premises.
Ratings are built from three separate scores, and on this scale a higher number is worse. Spud Kingz scored 20 for hygienic food handling, 15 for the condition of the structure and 20 for confidence in management.
The register records no right-to-reply statement from the business and no new rating pending, as of the copy we read on 7 September. A business that disagrees with a rating can appeal to the council, can publish a right to reply on the FSA site, and can request a re-inspection once it has put things right. The council’s food team can be reached at fhrs@stalbans.gov.uk.
The most recent inspections were mostly good
Fifty-seven ratings in the district were published between 1 July and 6 August 2026. That second date is the most recent rating anywhere on the district’s register, so the FSA’s published picture runs about a month behind. Of those 57:
- 39 were rated five
- 8 were rated four
- 8 were rated three
- one was rated two
- one was rated one
The one is Smoky Boys, a takeaway at 33 Vesta Avenue, St Albans AL1 2PG, rated on 2 July 2026 with scores of 15 for food handling, 10 for structure and 20 for confidence in management. The two is Premier Convenience, a shop at the former 96 to 98 London Road, St Albans AL1 1NX, rated on 21 July with 5, 15 and 10.
The fives in that batch run across the district and across the trades. They include The Cock in St Peters ward, The Three Horseshoes on Hatfield Road, the Samuel Ryder Hotel, Simmons Bakers at Tippendell Lane and at London Colney High Street, Grand Trunk Road and Lazy Bear in Harpenden, Aldwickbury Park Golf Club, Redbourn Cricket Club, the Co-op on Cell Barnes Lane, the Roundwood Park School canteen in Harpenden and Fonthill House retirement and nursing home at Kings Park.
What it means for you
A rating is a snapshot of one inspection, not a running score. It stands until the next visit, which is why a business rated in 2024 still shows that rating today. Check the date next to the score before you read anything into it.
Look at the three component scores, not just the star. A premises can lose its five on structure alone, which is about the building rather than the food. The three scores are published for every rated business on the FSA site.
Forty-one premises in the district have no rating yet. They are new and awaiting a first inspection, so an absent rating is not a bad rating.
If you want to raise something, the council is the route. Food safety complaints about a business in the district go to St Albans City and District Council, whose food hygiene team publishes its address on every entry in the register.
Sources
- Food Standards Agency: food hygiene ratings, and the agency’s open data register for the St Albans City authority, read on 7 September 2026. It supplied the 1,162 premises, the 1,063 with a rating, the counts at each score, the 58 exempt and 41 awaiting inspection, and every business name, address, rating date and component score quoted above.
- St Albans City and District Council: food hygiene rating scheme, the authority that carries out the inspections and handles appeals, right to reply and re-inspection requests.
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