Rodent poop gets two Florida Keys restaurants closed by inspection
What could bring temporary doom to two restaurants on the same day in the Florida Keys, where months often pass between state restaurant inspection failures?
Waste-dumping rodents, mainly.
That and other violations of food safety caused a woeful Wednesday at Meat Eatery and Taproom, and Party Cake. Both reopened after passing callback inspections. Party Cake was back open on Thursday. Meat Eatery, which had the fewer violations, stayed closed Thursday before passing re-inspection on Friday.
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In alphabetical order:
Meat Eatery and Taproom, 88005 Overseas Hwy., Plantation Key
Complaint inspection, nine total violations, five High Priority violations.
In an area described as “back storage/prep room,” rodents left two droppings in a handwash sink and three on top of a dishwasher.
Seven live roaches hung out on a dry food storage shelf in that room.
“Food-contact surface soiled with food debris, mold-like substance or slime ... “Slicer blade is soiled.”
Food sat on the floor of the walk-in cooler, an even bigger problem when combined with “the walk-in cooler floor is soiled/has accumulation of water and debris.”
Party Cake, 103200 Overseas Hwy., Key Largo
Routine inspection, 15 total violations, four High Priority violations
The rodents here seemed to consider the dishwasher next to the cookline their turf, leaving 12 droppings on top of the dishwasher and five pieces of poop under the dishwasher. There were also eight markers of rodent regularity by the back door, next to the kitchen area oven.
The wall behind the dishwasher was “soiled with accumulated grease, food debris and/or dust.” There was also “grease accumulated” on a kitchen stove and cookline fryer.
The inspector “observed raw chicken and raw steak stored on a soiled container at the cookline.”
Stop Sales slammed on ham and cheese sandwiches, regular size and minis; an egg sandwich; pork sandwiches; a ham and cheese croissant; and a Spanish omelette at the front counter because they weren’t time marked. There was no indication — and, apparently, nobody who knew and could properly time mark them — how long they’d been sitting there.
“Accumulation of black/green mold-like substance in the interior of the ice machine/bin.”
The hot water at the front counter handwash sink couldn’t reach the minimum 85 degrees.
