HOSPITAL managers have been forced to rename dishes on Loyd Grossman's menu after patients complained they could not understand the fancy titles.

Two of the National Menus recipes, put together with the help of Masterchef presenter Grossman, are to be included on hospital menus each day at Queen's Park Hospital and Blackburn Royal Infirmary by the end of March.

And although the menus have been dogged by controversy, managers are convinced they will not only be enjoyed by patients, they would be a treat even for Loyd.

No extra funding has been offered for the Blackburn, Hyndburn and Ribble Valley NHS Trust to introduce the meals, which the Government wants to see brought in to hospitals across the country by April.

There will be a different two "chef's hats" meals offered alongside the usual range each day and the pilot scheme will be monitored to see what patients think.

But managers admit they have had to be renamed, after they were originally called "fancy" names.

Facilities manager Mike Hall said: "A lot of our patients didn't know what the names meant. We went back to the centre and told them that, and we weren't alone. We are not saying Blackburn people can understand them any less than anywhere else, but it has been recognised nationally that they needed to be renamed

The original 45 dishes published under the Government's plan to improve hospital food across the country, had included names such as "navarin of lamb" which means lamb casserole. Others were smoked haddock shantle, carbonade of beef, turkey fricassee, haricot mutton and kidney turbigo.

But now new recipes have been brought in with less unusual names, including 16 vegetarian dishes, while others have been toned down to the point where only very minor changes need to be made . But, although he admitted some of the dishes were already on the current menu, Mr Hall defended the scheme.

"A lot of them are well liked by our patients. We are not going to take things off the menu that are really popular."

The menus were unveiled in a blaze of publicity costing £40million in May last year.

Last year the menus at Blackburn were described as "slop" by a research fellow from the University of Central Lancashire. The comments were later retracted.

A spokesman for NHS Estates, an executive agency of the Department of Health, which has been implementing the national menus, said: "We are not aware names of dishes have had to be changed."