A café in Derbyshire has been threatened with legal action and had its menu vandalised over the name of one of its sandwiches. The Bridge Bakehouse in Whaley Bridge received a strongly worded letter claimed to be from a religious organisation who had taken offensive to the sandwich's name.
The popular Peak District café boasts a selection of sandwiches with playful, punny names including "Don't go bacon my heart", "Are you chicken me out?" and "Get ya goat, you've pulled". However the sandwich in question, dubbed the "cheesus Christ", has sparked outrage from the Christian group who claim its name is an "insult to Christianity".
The sandwich, which contains caramelised onion, onion chutney, mature cheddar and mozzarella sandwich, has been on the menu since last year, but in the last week the sandwich's name has been painted over in white paint on the cafe's outdoor menu. The business also received the letter which threatened legal action.
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According to Derbyshire Live, the letter read: "Our members have instructed us to write to you to ask you to remove the sandwich name Cheesus Christ from your menu. Although our clients would prefer to [settle] this matter out of the courts, there is clearly a case to answer here.
"Everyone in the United Kingdom has the right to their beliefs without fear of discrimination. It is a basic human right that all institutions, including bakeries, have a duty to abide by and protect."
Stating the £4 sandwich's name was an "insult to Christianity", the letter demanded that to stop the author of the letter taking "the matter further", the cafe needed to follow four steps outlined in the letter. These included:
- Issue a public apology on the cafe's platforms, e.g. social media, website etc within 5 working dats if the date of the letter.
- Remove the sandwich name and all mention of it from the cafe's menus within 10 working days of the date of the letter.
- Remove any mention of the name Cheesus Christ from the sign standing on the Whaley Bridge Parish within 30 working days of the date on this letter.
- Make a donation of £300 to the Holy Trinity Church within 30 working days of the date of the letter.
The letter claimed to be from the religious organisation Christian Concern, but this was later confirmed to be fake by Bridge Bakehouse on its social media. A spokesperson for the cafe said: "So after investigations, it turns out the bizarre blackmail letter had nothing to do with Trinity Church or ‘Christian Concern’.
"It seems it was from an anonymous disgruntled member of the local community. We would still love to find out who it was and if they had anything to do with the recent vandalism of our menu board."
In reference to the graffiti on the menu board, the cafe responded in good humour, posting on social media: "To whoever has tried to cover up the ‘Cheesus Christ’ sandwich on our outdoor menu board with white paint can you please not?
"We really can’t be bothered contacting the council to check the CCTV and if it wasn’t done in the dead of night by someone dressed like The Mask of Zorro we are going to be highly disappointed."
We have contacted The Bridge Bakehouse for comment.
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