Dim-sum stuffed with pork-flavor cardboard

BEIJING, July 12 (UPI) -- A dim-sum restaurant in Beijing allegedly sold buns stuffed with a cardboard treated with caustic soda and flavored with pork fat.

Authorities in the Chinese capital closed the shop after a television program reported on the unusual and possibly dangerous filling, The Beijing Times reported. The owner allegedly decided to cheat his customers as pork prices rose and reportedly said that he was saving $132 a day.

The owner allegedly used a prep kitchen some distance from his shop to prepare the buns so customers wouldn't realize what they were purchasing. According to the television program, the filling was prepared by soaking cardboard in water and caustic soda to make it look like pork and then adding pork flavor and fat.

Health and safety inspectors said they would to examine the 58 dim-sum restaurants in the Chaoyang district to make sure no one was tricking customers.