FORGET roast beef. The Mad Cow scare is threatening an even greater Lancashire delicacy - the world famous black pudding!

It's not that people are shunning the mouth-watering mixture of blood, herbs and fat - demand is as great as ever.

It is simply that blood supplies have dried up in the wake of BSE mania.

Burnley's Nuttall's black pudding stall on the open market was forced to close for a week as slaughterhouses stopped killing beasts after beef demand throughout Europe plummeted.

Owner, Graham Sanderson, who makes around 1,000 puddings a week, was besieged by grateful customers when he re-opened the stall this week.

"We have been very busy indeed," he said.

"But I just don't know how things will go - the supply situation changes from day to day."

Graham, who bought the business and the secret recipe from long-established Jack Nuttall 15 years ago, added: "So much depends on how long the European ban on British beef goes on and that is anyone's guess."

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