The NHS has revealed St George’s Hospital as one of the worst in the UK for food.

While a hospital food shake-up has been announced by health bosses, the Tooting-based hospital was rated ‘among the worst’ for its quality of food.

Last week the health secretary Jeremy Hunt announced new legally-binding rules for hospital trusts to provide better quality food.

In the first set of new inspections hospitals up and down the country have been ranked on the quality of their food.

St George’s was ranked 1,049 out of 1,258 hospitals that responded. The cost of food services spent on each patient, per day, came to £6.50.

A spokeswoman for St George’s Hospital said: “The quality of patient meals is very high on the agenda at St George’s Healthcare NHS Trust.

"Our experienced dietitian team assess the food for its nutritional value and patient representatives are key to the development of our menus and the selection of our food providers.

"To help us cater for a diverse population St George’s offers 20 different menus across the trust.

"We also have specialised menus for patients who have difficulty swallowing and we are currently focusing on improving the food on offer for children.

"We encourage patients to give their feedback through our routine surveys and are always looking for ways to improve. We want to know if there is some food patients don’t like or if they think we could serve their meals in a better way.

"A very recent Come Dine With Us event, held at the main St George’s Hospital site, saw our meals receive rave reviews from patients, staff and hospital visitors.”