Miami to Palm Beach restaurants with rodents, roaches or too much filth to stay open
Dining room rodent poop. Ubiquitous roaches. Yes, the restaurants of Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach once again gave us a fat Sick and Shut Down List of failed state inspections.
Complaints about restaurants should be directed to the Florida Department of Business and Professional Regulation, not to us. Complaints about inspectors should be directed there, too. We just tell you what they see without passion or prejudice, but a little bit of humor and judgment.
In alphabetical order...
Avocados Food, at Sawgrass Mills Mall, 12801 W. Sunrise Blvd., Sunrise: Routine inspection, nine total violations, five High Priority violations.
“Establishment operating with no potable running water.”
Everything else flows (or doesn’t flow) from that.
“No dishwashing facilities of any kind provided ... only the three-compartment sink is available, which has no running water.”
The water at the employee handwash sink couldn’t get to 100 degrees because there was no running water in the first place.
The water was back on and the restaurant back open after the following day’s re-inspection.
La Casa De Peinado, 22777 State Rd. 7, Unincorporated Palm Beach County: Routine inspection, 10 total violations, five High Priority violations.
“Employee held the sanitizer bucket and after that, he touched the chicken tray.” The problem? No hand washing in-between.
Under a beverage cooler behind the dining room front counter, the inspector counted 20 live roaches, approximately. They’re tough to count when there’s a bunch of them scurrying.
“No probe thermometer provided...” You can cook at home without a probe thermometer — but when you’re cooking for others for business, you have to make sure your food is the proper temperature.
And kept at the proper temperature.
The chimichurri in the front station cooler, at least a day old, needed to be under 41 degrees. The inspector found it at 56 degrees. Stop Sale. Trashed.
La Casa was back open the next day.
CY Chinese Restaurant Szechuan Cuisine, 1242 NE 163rd St., North Miami Beach: Complaint inspection, 27 total violations, seven High Priority violations.
We told you earlier this week about the funk and furry things around this restaurant across the street from the Mall at 163rd Street.
READ MORE: Rodent poop, a useless cat and a general stink at a North Miami Beach restaurant
CY reopened after three inspections.
Donna’s Caribbean Restaurant, 19851 NW Second Ave., Miami Gardens: Complaint inspection, 13 total violations, four High Priority violations.
Under the triple sink, inspectors found over 10 roaches. Another two live roaches were under the stove. Three more were behind a reach-in cooler outlet.
Donna’s didn’t have any sanitizer in the house for warewashing. So the inspector ordered only single-service items could be used to serve customers food.
No paper towels or blow dryer at the handwash sink meant drippy hands for those who cared enough to wash.
The gaskets on the walk-in cooler were torn. The kitchen reach-in cooler door was broken.
When the inspector returned the next day, Donna’s had the live roach count down to one and the dead roach count up to 14. Still a failed re-inspection, but at least one with a bug body count.
Oh, and the gaskets and cooler door were still messed up.
Re-inspection No. 2, the third inspection overall, got Donna’s back in business.
Donna’s Restaurant & Cocktail Lounge, 5434 N. University Dr., Lauderhill: Complaint inspection, 15 total violations, seven High Priority violations.
Donna’s in Lauderhill made Donna’s in Miami Gardens look like operating room clean. The two restaurants have the same Margate-based ownership.
“Multiple areas of floor in the kitchen, lounge dining room, and dish room areas have a buildup of food debris along the edges of the walls.”’
“Ceiling tiles in front dining area discolored, show dust and mold-like buildup.”
Three-compartment sink sanitizer measured zero parts per million so the equipment wasn’t being properly sanitized.
Which is not what you want to see when you’ve got “Sewage/wastewater backing up through floor drains” under a kitchen reach-in cooler and in front of a kitchen handwash sink. The inspector saw “employees walking through the gray water and tracking it around the kitchen area.”
Rodents left five pieces of poop around the buffet area in the lounge; six on shelves near liquor bottles and glassware; seven droppings around dining room booths; nine along a dish room wall; 14 along a wall under the bar area; and “droppings too numerous to count under a shelving unit in far back stock room behind walk-in cooler where beverages are kept.”
Maybe they could feed the rodents some of the food smacked with Stop Sales for “temperature abuse,” which could be translated as “might abuse your digestive system with the possible bacteria buildup from not being stored properly.” Marinated chicken, cooked kidney, whole raw chicken, raw marinated chicken and raw oxtail all were too warm despite being in a cooler.”
This Donna’s passed re-inspection the first time.
The Original Pancake House, 4364 Northlake Blvd., Palm Beach Gardens: Complaint inspection, 25 total violations, nine High Priority violations.
“Employee wiped spatula with spiked cloth before using it to scramble eggs.” Yeah, that’s not exactly using clean, sanitized cookware, but then there wasn’t much here that counted as clean or sanitized.
“Clean plates” might not deserve the description after being stored on cookline shelves described as “heavily greasy.”
A “heavy accumulation of grease and food debris throughout the establishment” including the dining room, storage room, cookline and “under all equipment.”
If you don’t trust the inspector, ask the roaches and rodents. Three of the six live roaches spotted were under a waffle-making table on the cookline. The dead roaches numbered 29, six of which were under cold holding drawers and 10 next to an employee bathroom.
As for the rodents, they left six droppings under the waffle-making table, three on a table where clean pots (clean before the rodents ran over them) were stored, five under a cooler and four in the room where the ice maker sits.
Back to the inorganic violations, some cutting boards counted as “food contact surfaces soiled with food-debris, mold-like substance or slime.”
The mop sink didn’t have any running water, but reach-in cooler used to store bread made up for it with a “large amount of standing water.”
Surrounded by all of this, those working on the cookline couldn’t wash their hands at the handwash sinks. They didn’t have soap.
Upon re-inspection, the rodents either left or their territory markers got swept up before the inspector reappeared. But one live roach and nine dead ones, including three under a booth in a dining room, killed the Pancake House’s chances to get back in business that day.
The re-re-inspection got them re-re-opened.
Prezzo, 5560 N. Military Tr., Boca Raton: Complaint inspection, five total violations, one High Priority violation.
Three dead roaches on a salad station shelf.
The bar utensils, which should be in hot water measuring at least 135 degrees, were in cool water measuring 60 degrees. Not cool.
“Single-service articles stored next to handwash/food preparation sink exposed to splash.”
Of the 18 live roaches, they seemed to congregate on the ground behind a prep table and shelf next to the salad station (15). But, one loner was on a pizza station prep table.
Prezzo passed the callback inspection.
La Santamaria, food truck, 20800 SW 177th Ave., South Miami-Dade: Routine inspection, three total violations, two High Priority violations.
Three live roaches behind a refrigerator and one live roach inside a refrigerator were the main problems for this food truck.
“Bowl or other container with no handle used to dispense food.” This was a plastic container without a handle being used to get oil.
The truck was back rolling and serving after re-inspection.
Singing Bamboo West, 2845 N. Military Tr., Unincorporated Palm Beach County: Routine inspection, eight total violations, four High Priority violations.
Roaches on a prep table and rodents under kitchen dry storage shelves got this joint on the list back in October. So, what was the problem this time?
Same poop, different day.
As in, six pieces of rodent dung on the floor of the back dining room and 20 of them on the kitchen floor and under a reach-in cooler.
Also under a kitchen reach-in cooler: one live roach. But 10 roach corpses on the floor under a prep table and eight on the floor of the wait station and three under a kitchen handwash sink says somebody needs to grab a broom and stop pretending these dead bugs are almond slices.
Another repeater from October was the “accumulation of black/green mold-like substance in the interior of the ice machine/bin.”
The bucket of raw chicken on the floor of the walk-in freezer wasn’t covered.
The restaurant passed inspection the next day.
Travelers Caribbean Restaurant, 211 SW Fifth St., Belle Glade: Routine inspection, 10 total violations, four High Priority violations.
An “accumulation of grease/food debris” decorated the inside of the microwave. A manager touched hair then opened a sauce jug and went to work on chicken wings without washing hands at any point.
But what ended the Travelers day were the 41 pieces of rodent regularity, 15 of which were under a shelf with “large containers of flour, sugar and rice.” Another 10 were on the floor and lower shelves of the bar area. Two were around a handwash sink. About 10 were on a shelf in dry storage. Another four were on a shelf with pots and pans,
Either they killed, relocated or hid the rodents because Travelers passed the callback inspection.
Zen Sushi + Robata Grill, 9690 Glades Rd., Unincorporated Palm Beach County: Routine inspection, 12 total violations, four High Priority violations.
Clean pots were sitting on the floor. So, they’re not clean anymore.
A crate of utensils covered the main kitchen handwash sink, so you know there’s not much action there.
Speaking of covered, about 20 flies were “flying around and landing on clean wooden bowls on a prep table shelf.” Another 20 were doing the same on sauce containers and soda syrup cases. The smart seven flies were buzzing the liquor in the bar. Three were around single service cups at the coffee machine.
Don’t know how zen the vibe was after the first inspection at Zen, but after passing the second inspection, it should’ve been better.
