Moldy food, old food among inspection issues at Proper Sausages in Miami Shores
Two inspectors found too much improper about Proper Sausages as the Miami Shores butcher that also serves sandwiches failed state inspection on Dec. 20.
Proper passed a Jan. 6 re-inspection.
The Florida Department of Agriculture inspects butchers, retail bakeries, food processors, food storage facilities and packaged food sellers of all sizes, from supermarkets to places that have a few candy racks, such as a FedEx office.
Unlike Florida Department of Business and Professional inspections, failure doesn’t mean an automatic closing of the establishment. But the inspector can put a Stop Use Order on parts of the establishment. Enough of Stop Use orders and the owner might decide it’s not worth opening.
Proper Sausages didn’t get hit with a Stop Use order this time. In fact, it had Stop Sale orders for improper labeling pending from June 2021 lifted from its in-house prepared sauces and pickled vegetables.
But Inspectors James Zheng and Pedro Llanos found other problems, especially with a fruit some people mistake for a vegetable.
▪ In the food preparation area, “tomato stored in walk-in cooler found with white, mold-like substances.”
▪ “Food not obtained from sources that comply with the law...goose eggs brought from the owner’s home found for retail sale in a reach-in cooler.”
READ MORE: This longtime Houston favorite is now in Doral
▪ Also, foods for sale need to have ingredients (important for those who have or might be serving someone who has a food allergy), weight, manufacturer’s name, address and the name of the product.
In a retail area reach-in cooler, at least one of those required pieces of information was missing from hot sauce; pikliz, a Haitian pickled relish; pickled habanero; Castelvetrano olives; pickled shallots; pickled cauliflower; pickled jalapenos; duck rillette; tallow; black beans with jalapenos; salads and pesto. The tallow was labeled correctly. Everything else got trashed.
▪ Foods found stored in the prep area walk-in for more than seven days included jalapenos that had been there 12 days; duck rillette that had been there 41 days; a bucket of habanero that had been there for 35 days and a jar of habaneros that had been there for two months and 12 days; and cauliflower that had been there 12 days. All of those were thrown out, along with shallots that were right on the seven-day limit.
Chili made on Dec. 15 was marked to be kept longer than seven days.
▪ There was a “visible gap along the bottom of the back door leading outside,” a violation of the outer opening “not being protected against the entry of insects and rodents by...solid, self-closing, tight-fitting doors.”
This story was originally published December 27, 2022 at 12:15 PM.
