A roach in sugar. Rice in a bucket for sanitizer. Keys to Palm Beach restaurant filth
The Sick and Shut Down List comes back from a technology-forced hiatus and this week we have something new and unique added to the menu of violations: Rice in a bucket that previously held pool sanitizer (not food grade storage). This didn’t happen at the same place that had two flies in the panko.
So, let’s get to the list of restaurants in the Miami-Fort Lauderdale-Palm Beach-Florida Keys area that didn’t have their stuff up to snuff when inspectors arrived.
THE RULES OF THIS GAME: What follows comes from Florida Department of Business and Professional Regulation restaurant inspections in Miami-Dade, Broward, Palm Beach and Monroe counties. A restaurant that fails inspection remains closed until passing an inspection.
If you see a problem and want a place inspected, contact the DBPR. We don’t control who gets inspected nor how strictly the inspector inspects.
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 after the inspector points them out. But, you have to ask, why do the violations exist in the first place? And how long would they have remained if not for the inspection?
In alphabetical order...
Dlc Caribbean Restaurant, 2441 10th Ave. N, Lake Worth: Routine inspection, 26 total violations, eight High Priority violations.
Too many roaches and too little hot water last put this place on the Sick and Shut Down List 10 months ago. This time, there’s no lack of hot water. Too much of it wound up on the floor, however.
“Floor area(s) covered with standing water.”
With no soap at the women’s restroom handwash sink, no way to dry hands at the kitchen handwash sink and neither at the front service area handwash sink, that makes the front service area and the women’s restroom doorway a “No Handshake, No High Five, No Fist Bump” zone.
Better just give a nod of solidarity.
Some places have yellow rice, some places have brown rice, some places have white rice. But how many places have Speedo rice?
“Food stored in a container that previously held a toxic substance...Rice stored in bucket previously containing pool sanitizer.” The inspector dropped a Stop Sale on that.
The cutting boards and the inside of the microwave had an “accumulation of black substance/grease/food debris,” which were better than the inside of coolers and ovens being “soiled with dead roaches.”
A cookline oven had six of those dead roaches. It also contained nine live roaches and a (fortunately) unused cooler had 19, the largest concentrations of the 56 running roaches the inspector counted. Eight of them were in a crack in the wall.
The reach-in coolers worked better as roach morgues than food coolers, seeing as how chicken, turkey, cabbage and plantains in the coolers were over 10 degrees too warm. Stop Sales all around.
When the inspector returned for Friday’s re-inspection, the inspector saw live roaches on a mop sink wall, in the gasket of a reach-in cooler and in an unused cooler. The manager killed the roaches and removed the coolers from the restaurant, but the inspector still flunked him.
Dlc passed re-re-inspection on Saturday.
READ MORE: Mold, dead rodent cause Miami area Presidente Supermarkets to fail inspections
Hook Fish & Chicken, 5701 N. Australian Ave., West Palm Beach: Complaint inspection, 17 total violations, eight High Priority violations.
You’d say the inspector just didn’t want to count bugs with the citation, “presence of dead insects and other pests throughout the dining room and kitchen,” but this inspector opened the dead roach section with “observed approximately 69 dead” before doing the placement breakdown.
Five of the corpses were at the drive-thru window. Three were at the slushee dispenser. Two were in the dining room. Ten live roaches dotted the joint.
The front counter soda cooler had five dead flies inside.
“Food stored in a location that is exposed to splash/dust. Black beans container and raw chicken containers stored under a leaking pipe in the walk-in cooler. Water accumulated on top of the containers.”
The coleslaw in the display cold holding case didn’t stay cold enough to keep from being bacteria bowls and got hit with a Stop Sale. Tossed.
This place passed re-inspection on June 14.
Hurricane Hole, 5130 Overseas Highway, Key West: Routine inspection, 21 total violations, seven High Priority violations.
Ah, yes, the ice machine. “Accumulation of black/green mold-like substance in the interior of the ice machine/bin...”
“Floor areas covered with standing water” in the prep area, front counter area and the dishwasher area.
But this is really about the Stop Sales of the sugar with a live roach inside; the cut onions with a live fly on top of them; the panko container with two live flies; and ice used for drinks that had held beer bottles.
The Hole passed Friday’s re-inspection.
Patio Bar & Grille, 2096 NE Second St., Deerfield Beach: Complaint inspection, 10 total violations, seven High Priority violations.
The front bar area had 35 rodent droppings under the ice bin, at the service station and behind the bar’s dishwashing machine.
A dead fly was on the edge of the ice bin. Maybe he got zapped by the “insect control device” over the ice bin, the clean dishes or the prep table.
Food handlers appeared fuzzy on the whole hand washing and gloves thing. “At cookline; employee switched from handling raw fish to handling ready to eat food/clean dishes without washing hands” and “employee used bare hand to touch, cut leafy greens.”
Five flies hovered at the dripping water line at the service station under the sink. Another 10 flies did the same around an ice bin drain.
When the inspector finished counting rodent poop and flies, the Stop Sales flew, hitting cooked shrimp and house-made Caesar salad in a drawer and a reach-in cooler.
The patio was back open after a same-day re-inspection.
This story was originally published June 22, 2022 at 6:00 AM.
