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Rodent droppings on a wine display cabinet, live flies in a dining room and wastewater backing up through floor drains were among the issues that forced shut three South Florida restaurants last week.
The South Florida Sun Sentinel typically highlights restaurant inspections conducted by the Florida Department of Business and Professional Regulation in Broward and Palm Beach counties. We cull through inspections that happen weekly and spotlight places ordered shut for “high-priority violations,” such as improper food temperatures or dead cockroaches.
Any restaurant that fails a state inspection must stay closed until it passes a follow-up. If you spotted a possible violation and wish to file a complaint, contact Florida DBPR. (But please don’t contact us: The Sun Sentinel doesn’t inspect restaurants.
Ordered shut: Sept. 8; reopened Sept. 9
Why: Eight violations (six high-priority), including “wastewater coming up from floor drain next to kitchen hand sink,” causing employees to track the wastewater across the floor.
The state also caught one employee “on cook line leaving kitchen, opening walk-in cooler door and returning with items to line and changing gloves without washing hands first.”
The restaurant was ordered to stop selling and trash its chicken soup, sliced cheddar cheese, cooked ribs and deli turkey “due to temperature abuse.”
Finally, inspectors spotted “two soiled wiping cloths on prep table” and an improperly stored “pack of raw burgers above open pack of raw breaded fish” in the chest freezer.
The state greenlit the wing restaurant’s reopening the next day after discovering zero new problems.
Ordered shut: Sept. 7; reopened Sept. 8
Why: Four violations (three high-priority), including one “roach crawling on the wall at main entry and exit door at the front of the establishment.”
The report also noted 18 live flies around and on a “wall in dry storage area,” “on wall between men and female restrooms in dining area,” “on wall in dining area” and “on wall at soda beverage machine in dining area.” There were also five dead flies “on wall in female restroom” inside a pest-control device.
The fast-food chain reopened the following day after its second inspection yielded zero new issues.
12794 W. Forest Hill Blvd., Suite 20
Ordered shut: Sept. 5-6; reopened Sept. 7
Why: 24 violations (eight high-priority), including “several live spiders throughout the kitchen and dry food storage room,” as well as eight cockroaches crawling “in trash can by dishwasher,” “on floor by dishwasher,” “between wall and caulking behind drain board before dishwasher,” “on the wall on the side of the oven” and next to a box of instant coffee “in dry food storage room.” There was one dead roach “under hand sink on cook line.”
The inspection also red-flagged 17 rodent droppings “on top of wine display cabinet by self-serve station in dining room,” on the “server station in dining room” and on the floor beside and on top of the “wine display cabinet near mall entrance in the dining room.”
Multiple cross-contamination issues included “self-service salad bar/buffet lacking adequate sneezeguards or other proper protection from contamination,” notably in the rice pudding area. Similarly, “plates and soup bowls at self-serve station” were also “not properly protected” from contamination. There was even “Alpine cockroach gel bait stored next to lemon juice bottle” on a prep-table shelf.
One employee was seen putting a cellphone in pocket then putting on gloves “without washing hands.” Meanwhile, a “prep person cut broccoli head before washing” instead of washing the produce beforehand.
Other The restaurant was ordered shut again the next day because of unresolved live roach issues, but was cleared to reopen on Sept. 7 after its third inspection found a single intermediate violation. The Indian eatery was previously ordered shut in February for rodent dropping issues.