A leak on the food. Bugs at Taco Bell. What to know about South Florida restaurant filth
There’s a first-time violation involving air conditioning condensation and meat in this week’s list of restaurants in Miami-Dade and Broward that failed inspection.
So, let’s get to it.
HOW WE DO THIS: What follows comes from Florida Department of Business and Professional Regulation restaurant inspections. These are the restaurants that failed inspection. A restaurant that fails inspection remains closed until passing an inspection.
We don’t do the inspections. We don’t control who gets inspected. We don’t control how strictly the inspector inspects. If restaurants in your part of South Florida are not included. If you see a problem and want a place inspected, contact the DBPR. Do not email us with “you should check out...”
We don’t include all violations, just the most moving, whether internally or literally moving (because it’s alive or once was alive). Some violations get corrected immediately after the inspector points them out. But in those situations, ask yourself, why did the violations exist in the first place? And, how long would they have remained if not for the inspection?
We report without passion or prejudice, but more than a dollop of humor (and, possibly, indignation and exasperation).
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In alphabetical order...
Healthy Kitchen33, 27411 S. Dixie Hwy., South Miami-Dade: Routine inspection, 27 total violations, eight High Priority violations.
The Philly steak wasn’t covered at the reach-in freezer. Though lacking store brand Saran Wrap or ersatz Tupperware, the Philly steak beat the gyro meat on location.
Because the gyro meat wasn’t just well-situated for the lone fly to land on it, but perfectly placed for “water leaking from the ceiling through the hood onto the cookline preparation table, splashing over gyro meat and rice cooker.”
That came from rain or air-conditioning condensation and, filtered through the ceiling, hit the gyro meat with the force of a Stop Sale.
For a place called “Healthy Kitchen,” flow and fluid problems proliferated.
“Sewage/wastewater backing up through the pipeline under the handwashing sink onto the floor at the preparation area located next to hood.”
One handwash sink had only room temperature water. Another handwash sink had no water. One with water had no soap and way to dry your hands.
Healthy Kitchen got it together for re-inspection the next day.
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J’s Kitchen, 196 N. Federal Hwy. Deerfield Beach: Routine inspection, 13 total violations, five High Priority violations.
J’s coolers belonged in a Progressive commercial, they were so uncool.
First, they didn’t do the basic job of cooling food to at least 41 degrees. In fact, they did it so poorly, a fusillade of Stop Sales took out cooked pork, sprouts, raw shrimp, raw beef, cooked rice, in the walk-in cooler and cooked pork and sprouts in a cookline flip top cooler.
The cookline cooler served as either the roach morgue (over five dead roaches) or the roach food court (over 20 live roaches).
Another 10 live roaches ran around a handwash sink while two were on a shelf that had clean wares and dry storage items. A bag of single-service containers on a shelf above that had over 20 live roaches scurrying about.
Oh, and the inspector saw a “high accumulation of roach droppings on the wall at the handwash sink and on the shelving above the handwash sink and triple sink.”
J’s situation took two days to correct for re-inspection.
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La Caravane Take Out Restaurant, 560 NE 44th St., Pompano Beach: Routine inspection, two total violations, one High Priority violation.
Appropriate timing — the NHL playoffs just started with the Florida Panthers participating and we have our first Gretzky Award winner in a while, achieving a hat trick of failed inspections.
As you can see from the total violations, this is all about the bugs. Yes, the floor under the fryers had too much grease, but that pales as a problem next to three live roaches between the wall and a handwashing sink; four live roaches on a wall next to kitchen fryers; and over 10 live roaches inside of “cove molding behind the reach-in coolers in the kitchen.”
During re-inspection, two live roaches on the wall behind the cook line equipment and another two in the vent of a chest freezer kept La Caravane closed.
For inspection No. 3, four live roaches and four dead roaches completed the hat trick.
The fourth inspection got La Caravane open again.
Taco Bell, 2451 N. University Dr., Sunrise: Complaint inspection, five total violations, three High Priority violations.
Let’s be frank — all of us under 60 with any sense carried suspicions about every Taco Bell, but buried them deep beneath our desire for drunk food, munchie food or Americanized Mexican cheap fast food.
Actually, other than the flies and crawling bugs, this inspection’s big problem were the vents in the kitchen “soiled with accumulated food debris, grease, dust, or mold-like substance.”
But the insects were a little too ubiquitous to overlook. Especially when five of them were “crawling on a prep table.”
And 10 flies were “landing on a beverage dispenser nozzle where beverage was dispensed for customer consumption.”
Taco Bell was back slinging burritos and burps after the next day’s re-inspection.
