Posted on 02/11/2014 6:23:50 PM PST by rickmichaels
MONTREAL - A Tim Hortons store is liable for over $69,000 after hot soup caused a "personal tsunami" of pain in a Montreal woman's mouth, a judge has ruled.
The judge agreed with Lucie Laflamme's claim that the cream of potato and bacon soup was "excessively hot" and caused "severe burning" and "years of pain and loss of taste."
On Aug. 14, 1998, the city engineering technician entered the restaurant and ordered soup while nursing a sore throat, said Superior Court judge Mark G. Peacock in his ruling, which came down last week.
He described what he calls Laflamme's "fateful choice" to take the first spoonful.
"She ... testified that it was 'like eating fire,'" judge Peacock ruled. "She testified that she had never eaten anything so hot. Ms. Laflamme also testified that this one soup-spoonful was her own personal 'tsunami' which completely changed her life."
She said she visited an emergency room, a clinic and even a dentist's office but the pain wouldn't go away.
Laflamme said she never returned to her job, went on permanent disability and was laid off in 2006.
She claimed the Tim's "knew or should have known" that the soup was excessively hot.
The company contends the soup was served "at about 170 (degrees) Fahrenheit," which they said was an industry standard.
But the judge pointed to the defendants' own admission that their soup was, in fact, heated to a level that could have caused "serious" mouth burns.
Furthermore, Peacock said the restaurant's bowls did not include warnings to that effect.
He awarded Laflamme $69,454.59 in damages.
-----Horsecrap!
You and me both. Like skin removal of the roof of your mouth LOL.
Looks like the Canucks found out that ‘Litigation Lottery’ can be anyone’s ticket to freedom!
You’re supposed to blow on it, lady.
Ah ,so that must be why it’s 69K , LOL
Doesn’t everyone try their soup before taking a big mouthful!? She gets $69,000 because she was too stupid to test it first - If you have the soup too cool then you will get bacteria then she would sue for food poisoning. If there is an industry standard and they adhered to it then they should get to sure her for being so dumb and causing them grief in the process!
Tim Horton’s take-out coffee is poured way too hot. I suppose the idea is it’ll still be hot, when you get to the rink. However, it is hot enough to scald, thus following Murphy’s Law, you will be scalded eventually (it has scalded the inside of my mouth). It’s not so bad, when eating in, because the thick ceramic mug absorbs a lot of the excess heat. I don’t know what they’re thinking; but, if this lawsuit causes them to dial down the temperatures a bit, then it’s a good thing.
How hot do you think Tim Horton’s coffee is?
Not hotter than boiling, surely.
Standard coffee brewing temp is 190 to 200 degrees. Mr. Coffee’s website says their machine brews coffee at 195 to 200 degrees.
My coffee comes out at about 195 degrees.
So how cold do you like your coffee?
What is your real name?
Goldilocks?
Our kids learned to safely eat or drink hot foods & beverages at a very young age. Most people above the age of 6 or 8 have learned that cooked foods and boiled beverages are at a temperature somewhere between scalding hot and room temperature.
Until you determine where on that temp scale your food/beverage currently is, prudence demands that you take very small sips/bites. At the worst, if you are extremely impatient and careless then only the tip of your tongue or your lips will be "burned".
They must make it in a percolator.
Next time she comes in she’s qui y escorted out.
#1: open can, pour into saucepan, heat until boiling, put in bowl, eat when cooled enough.
#2: open can, pour into dish, nuke until boiling, eat.
Both of those involve having a boiling liquid and knowing when it is safe to eat.
She never learned to take a tiny taste of her food before shoving a whole spoonful into her mouth? Does she fill her tub full of hot water and jump in without checking it?
Horton’s needs a better set of attorneys.
Have you ever actually taken a gulp of coffee at 195* F? Try it, and get back to me.
McDonalds used to serve coffee that hot, until they lost their lawsuit. Now, they serve it at about 175* F. My ideal drinking temperature (coffee and milk) is about 160*F — hotter than tepid, but cool enough that I can actually enjoy the taste.
Tim Horton’s leaves coffee on electric hotplates (for under 20 minutes, usually), so I’m not sure what temperature it gets to; but it does get too hot to drink from a paper take-out cup. (As I said, it’s about right if poured into a big heavy mug.) It’s also too hot to risk spilling on yourself. Don’t mess with Murphy’s Law.
When my children were young, we never set scalding-hot liquids in front of them. Murphy’s Law again.
Scalding hot liquids, and moving motor vehicles are a bad combination. When I buy a take-out coffee, I want to be able to actually drink it. If wanting to drink the coffee, before I reach my destination, is “extremely impatient”, then I plead guilty.
Have you ever actually taken a gulp of coffee at 195* F? Try it, and get back to me
My wife can sip the 195° coffee right out of the pot with no problems.
Myself, however, due to breathing hot gases during a chopper crash, I can’t drink it near that hot. However the spicier the food, the better. I have a seasoning made from Trinidad Scorpion peppers (one of the hottest in the world) that I put on everything.
Go figure.
I'm a big fan of hot capsicum peppers. I go through several bottles of the hottest sauces every year, and I make a mean Texas-style chile. The more capsaicin, the better. However, that's the picante type of "hot", not the caliente type of hot we were discussing. Capsaicin creates the sensation of pain, without actually causing a chemical burn (unlike, say, wasabi sauce, which can burn your skin). Self-described "pepper heads" eat hot peppers and sauces to stimulate the production of endorphins, and get a "runner's high", without having to bother with the actual running.
As Mr. Coffee says and I have confirmed with a digital thermometer, the coffee comes out at 196°. When we make coffee, we immediately pour it in pre-heated cups. My wife can start sipping right then.
Due to burns in my throat, I can’t. I was not saying that temperature hot and spicy hot are comparable, just thought it was unusual that I can handle spicy hot foods hotter than anyone I know.
A 1 second exposure to 160 degree water can cause 3rd degree burns. How cold do you want your coffee?
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