Food safety: Cockroaches, old eggs, no hot water at local businesses
Editor’s note: The Eagle is updating its out-of-compliance inspection database weekly this year. However, because the COVID-19 pandemic has slowed inspections, there may be no related story some weeks. You can search the database at www.kansas.com/databases.
A cafe, a Chinese restaurant, a Salvadoran cuisine restaurant, a gas station and a local home improvement store are the latest Sedgwick County businesses to fail their Kansas Department of Agriculture food and lodging safety inspections. Violations that led to them falling out of compliance with state expectations include water problems, old deli meats and hard-boiled eggs, and a cockroach infestation, according to a check of inspection reports.
Some of the Wichita-area businesses inspected March 7-13 were surveyed remotely due to the COVID-19 pandemic, but many had health inspections onsite. The Eagle has a list of the five non-compliant businesses below along with a summary of the problems inspectors noted on their reports. You can read specifics about the violations by searching The Eagle’s non-compliant database at www.kansas.com/databases. This list was compiled March 15.
Inspection failures don’t necessarily mean business closures. Most violations are corrected on site as an inspection happens, and follow-up visits usually occur within 10 days to ensure safe food-handling practices are observed. Businesses fall out of compliance when they have a certain number or type of problem that can lead to foodborne illnesses, or problems that can’t be corrected right away, such as plumbing issues and pest infestations.
More than 60 businesses surveyed last week passed their inspections with few or no violations. You can see those at www.foodsafety.kda.ks.gov/FoodSafety/Web/Inspection/PublicInspectionSearch.aspx.
To complain about conditions at a business, email kda.fsl@ks.gov or call 785-564-6767.
Recent out of compliance inspections:
Jump Start, 444 N. Oliver in Kechi — Four violations for selling doughnuts from a store that doesn’t have a food processing license, old mozzarella cheese, no food thermometer on site, no equipment for testing the strength of sanitizer
Little Firehouse Cafe, 120 N. Baltimore in Derby — Three violations for storing eggs at unsafe temperatures, old hard-boiled eggs and chili, old deli meats, cockroaches
Lowe’s Home Improvement, 333 S. Ridge Rd. in Wichita — One violation for water not getting hot enough at the sinks in the men’s and women’s restrooms
New Good Fortune, 10410 W. Maple in Wichita — Two violations for having dirty knives and water that didn’t get hot enough at a kitchen sink
Puerto El Triunfo Restaurant, 1714 E. Northern St. in Wichita — Six violations for improper food storage, soup kept at unsafe temperatures, no supplies to test the strength of sanitizer, not enough sanitizer used to clean dishes, no hot water in bathrooms due to a broken water pipe, no hand-drying supplies at a kitchen sink
This story was originally published March 17, 2021 at 12:29 PM.
