Couple Sues Firms Over Rat in Instant Soup

Hughes Markets has pulled all Nissin Food products from its stores because a woman charged in a lawsuit that she found part of a rat in a Cup O’Noodles she purchased at a Canyon Country supermarket.

Harland Polk, vice president of sales for Hughes Markets, said the chain’s shelves were stripped of nearly 1,000 cases of Nissin products--including Cup O’Noodles, Top Ramen and Ramen Classic--Tuesday morning as a precaution until the incident is investigated.

The Los Angeles-based chain has 47 stores in Los Angeles, Ventura, Orange and San Bernardino counties.

It will be up to Nissin to determine what to do about the allegation, he said.

Hughes and Nissin were named in a lawsuit filed Friday in San Fernando Superior Court by Robert and Sharon Mathie, who purchased a Cup O’Noodles Oriental on Jan. 6 at a Hughes Market on Soledad Canyon Road.

On Jan. 20, while sharing the meal with her 4-year-old daughter, she discovered a rat in the cup, the suit said. Mathie and her husband said in the suit that they did not eat the noodle soup, but the emotional trauma of the discovery has made it difficult for them to work ever since.

“We have no knowledge of this incident,” said Mike Sakai, manager of marketing for Nissin Foods. “I don’t see how it could happen here.”

Polk and Sakai said their companies had not received legal notification of the suit, which they learned of from reporters. The Mathies never complained to the companies, they said.