Unsafe food, handwashing violations at popular Miami-area kosher supermarket
Workers not washing their hands enough, sink inadequacies and various food safety violations caused an Aventura kosher supermarket to fail state inspection last week.
Wednesday’s visit to Kosher Kingdom Supermarket, 3017 NE 199th St., by Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services inspectors Lourdes Chantez and Carolyn Dragone included a flurry of Stop Sale Orders and ended with “Re-Inspection Required,” the designation of failure.
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While their restaurant-inspecting counterparts in the Florida Department of Business & Professional Regulation can close places that fail inspection, that’s not an arrow in these Ag inspectors’ quivers. They can put Stop Use Orders on equipment and areas, however, and that happened during this inspection.
Here’s some of what they saw:
In the food area, an employee washed dishes without sanitizing them.
At least the dishes got washed. In the meat area, a bandsaw, knives and cutting boards weren’t cleaned after four hours of use. Food service area slicers also weren’t cleaned within four hours after first slicing.
The bakery area’s “large and small mixers have a buildup on the underside of the paddle attachment.”
In the bakery, an “employee was frosting cakes without gloves and touching the frosting.”
Even when those working with food don gloves, they’re required to wash their hands before doing so. The inspectors saw that didn’t happen in the food processing area, the pizza area and the bakery area.
Then again, the pizza area didn’t have soap or paper towels at the handwash sink. The bakery area went that one worse: no soap, no paper towels and the “hot water turned off at the valve.”
The hot dog cart area didn’t have soap, towels or hot water at the handwash sink because it didn’t have a working handwash sink. “An unplumbed hand sink on cart was fixed for immediate use. Establishment has 30 days to properly plumb a hand sink or to move the hot dog cart to an area with hand sink.”
Also, whether restaurant or supermarket, nothing’s supposed to be in a handwash sink but the dirt, water and soap from your hands. So, each of these counts as a no-no: an employee peeling hard-boiled eggs over “items left thawing” in the food processing area handwash sink; “meat residue” in the meat department handwash sink; and “utensils stored” in the pizza area handwash sink.
The path to the sink must be clear, too. No “rolling rack stored in front of the handwash sink” as in the bakery or “trash can in front of the hand sink” as in the sushi area.
More things you don’t want to see in a meat department: “Multiple frozen meats left on the preparation table to thaw at ambient temperature overnight.” When the manager returned, all the frozen meats were put in the walk-in cooler, under refrigeration, which is where all thawing should be done.
Throughout the kitchen, bakery and meat departments, “in-use wet wiping cloths were placed on preparation tables where food is exposed (instead of) in sanitizer buckets.”
The bakery area’s three-compartment sink has “old food residue and stains.”
Bakery shelves had “old food residue” and “old food residue was accumulated on the bottom rung of the mixer” and on the bakery floor.
The inspectors saw a “customer touching various cookies and muffins with bare hands in the self service area.” Stop Sales zapped seven cookies and muffins.
“Multiple cans found to be dented on the seam on the retail shelves” led to Stop Sales on three cans.
Fruit in the retail display cooler for four hours after being cut in the morning measured 42 to 47 degrees instead of being at or under 41 degrees. Sprouts in the retail cooler measured 42 to 46 degrees. Stop Sales on the fruit and sprouts.
Meatloaf cooked the day before still measured 44 degrees despite time in the walk-in cooler: Stop Sale. Same for beef in the walk-in cooler that hadn’t properly cooled.
At the food service area, five “prepared items in the display case had an internal temperature of 43-50 degrees,” bringing down the Stop Sale lightning.
This story was originally published February 2, 2026 at 12:49 PM.
