A SUPERMARKET garlic-taster whose pungent breath put off potential girlfriends has finally found love - with the store's parsley buyer.

Simon Holt, of Accrington, turned to Charlotte Wright for help after hearing parsley would neutralise the smell - but little did he realise his requests for sprigs of parsley would lead to a budding romance.

The pair, who work for Tesco's produce department in Hertfordshire, fell in love when Simon poured his heart out to Charlotte about his breath.

The 32-year-old, who went Mount Carmel High School, Accrington, and whose parents live in Oswaldtwistle, said his job sees him tasting up to 50 batches of garlic a week. He said: "It never occurred to me the woman I was confessing all my problems to would be the one to finally solve them.

"Besides testing garlic I also check onions - I must be every woman's nightmare date. People usually stand at least four feet away and my desk is in a corner near a perpetually open window.

"I thought the only option would be to advertise in a lonely hearts column for a female garlic taster but I didn't think there could be many around."

Simon's romance took off with Charlotte after he asked her for parsley before every date and at weekends.

Charlotte, 29, from Hertford, Hertfordshire, said: "Like everyone else, I jumped back when I first got a whiff of Simon's breath but since nobody wanted to go near his desk I felt sorry for him.

"Seeing that parsley is an antidote to bad breath I felt I could help. Over the months I actually looked forward to him coming over and pouring out his heart to me before asking for some more parsley and things grew from there."