Roaches on scallops, rodents at airport among Miami area’s worst inspections

Adding an automatic tip without letting customers know you’re doing it, roach and rodent excrement and stinky sewage helped put restaurants on this week’s list of inspection failures.

The 16 restaurants on this week’s Sick and Shut Down List represent all of South Florida, from Key West to Miami to Broward to North Palm Beach.

Inspections are done by the Florida Department of Business & Professional Regulation, sometimes after customer complaints. All restaurants that fail inspection remain closed until they pass a re-inspection, usually the next day.

In alphabetical order:

Burger Shack, 617 N. A1A, Jupiter

Routine inspection, nine total violations, six high priority violations

Five roaches died on the floor around the dishwasher and two breathed last on the floor next to cookline fryers.

Six roaches scaled the wall between the fryers and the mop sink.

“Employee handled container of raw chicken and, without washing hands, handled cleaned and sanitized plates to prepare customer food.”

Had the employees done proper handwashing, there were no paper towels or air blower to do proper hand drying.

After more than six yours in a reach-in cooler, the cooked wings still weren’t at or under 41 degrees. Stop Sale on the wings.

Cafe Enclave, 524 W. 27th St., Hialeah

Routine inspection, nine total violations, five high priority violations

The rodents decided the floor behind the bar area’s beer reach-in cooler made for a fine toilet, leaving 19 droppings there.

The inspector saw “several wet wiping cloths on top of the preparation table next to steam table at kitchen area” when they should be resting in a sanitizing solution between uses.

Commercially processed reduced oxygen packaged fish usually has a label saying the product should stay frozen until removal from the packaging for use. The inspector saw four whole yellow snappers still in packaging and thawed inside the walk-in cooler. Stop Sale on the four snappers.

READ MORE: A Miami company recalled 29,000 pounds of Argentine beef from Texas and Florida

Eleventh Street Pizza, 9025 SW 72nd Pl., Dadeland

Routine inspection, 13 total violations, six high priority violations

Two flies at the front counter around the beer tap were next to over 20 flies in bags of red onions under a kitchen prep table. Stop Sale on the bags of red onions.

“Throughout the kitchen” the inspector saw “ceiling/ceiling tiles/vents soiled with accumulated food debris, grease, dust, or a mold-like substance.”

Sugar sat on the floor in the back of the kitchen. Pizza boxes sat on the front counter floor.

The meat slicer was “soiled.”

The reach-in cooler measured 55 degrees — food needs to be kept at or under 41 degrees. So, Stop Sales rained down on mozzarella cheese, roasted onions, roasted garlic, roasted mushrooms (72 degrees) and Alfredo sauce (70 degrees).

Famous Famiglia Pizzeria, Miami International Airport, Concourse H/J food court, Miami

Routine inspection, six total violations, three high priority violations

Welcome to Miami International Airport (”Bienvenido a Miami!”) for the first of two food stops on this week’s list.

“Accumulation of black/green mold-like substance in the interior of the ice machine/bin.”

On the back of the prep area’s reach-cooler, rodents left 10 droppings. Another seven poop pellets sat in a cabinet drawer under the front counter cash register.

Yet another reach-cooler was about as cool as Vanilla Ice: cut ham spent the night in the cooler and still measured 51 degrees, 10 degrees above the maximum allowed in cold storage. Stop Sale on the ham.

Kanto Asian Street Food, 720 Lake Ave., Lake Worth Beach

Routine inspection, 18 total violations, nine high priority violations

This week’s first recidivist restaurant, returning to the list with 10 more violations than last October.

Three roach corpses were under a cooler. One was on a quarternary dispenser over the three-compartment sink next to roach excrement.

Five roaches on the floor were “surrounding a soiled tea bag packet.” One roach toddled along on a dry storage shelf that stored clean plates. Another one was spotted on a wall next to the sugar in dry storage. Roaches were also spotted in the restroom and under a storage rack in dry storage.

Speaking of dry storage, the floor possessed an “accumulation of food debris.”

An employee “dropped off soiled cups at the triple sink, then immediately handled a plate of ready-to-eat customer food without first washing hands.”

“Establishment using wood (other than a hard, close-grained wood) as a food-contact surface.” How so? “A wood storage container is being used in the kitchen reach-in cooler.”

Someone forgot to put the tapioca boba pearls in a cooler. A night at room temperature had the boba pearls at 77 degrees when the inspector dropped by. Stop Sale on the pearls.

La Granja Chicken Steak & Seafood, 6144 S. Dixie Hwy., South Miami

Routine inspection, nine total violations, four high priority violations

Another place where the flies got down on the onions as more than 25 got inside a bag of onions in the kitchen. Stop Sale on the onions.

Considering those 25-plus flies and the other four the inspector saw, how effective was the “insect control device installed over a food preparation area,” where it’s not supposed to be?

The cookline floor was “covered with standing water.”

Mil Amores Mexican Food, 421 Northlake Blvd., North Palm Beach

Routine inspection, two total violations, one high priority violation

“Very slow draining water in the cookline handwash sink.”

There was “raw sewage on establishment’s kitchen floor overflowing from the drains. A very strong odor of raw sewage and water rapidly flooded the cook line. Water cannot be isolated as it’s rapidly flowing under the cooler at cookline, the three-compartment sink, dishwashing area, and cooking equipment.”

New York Pasta Garden, 1075 Duval, Key West

Routine inspection, 27 total violations, five high priority violations

With a “broken screen door at a food preparation area,” the vermin invasion could have been worse than a reach-in cooler with two dead roaches and three roaches crawling on top of food containers.

Then again, those containers of raw scallops, cubed butter and cooked shrimp each got hit with a Stop Sale for being on the roaches’ path across the cooler.

About 20 flies filled the air under the three-compartment sink.

“Soiled can opener blade.”

Flour was “stored in black, non-food containers…”

All three cookline reach-in cooler had “standing water in the bottom”

“The interior of the microwave has accumulation of black substance/grease/food debris.”

The walk-in cooler sported “dust and grease accumulated on fans.”

There was no way to dry hands at one of the handwash sinks.

Pack Supermarket, 8235 NE Second Ave., Miami

Routine inspection, 25 total violations, five high priority violations

The Pack is back: For the fourth time since Oct. 7, 2025, Pack has racked up over 20 violations in failing its initial inspection, this time matching its previous high of 25 total violations.

“Exterior door has a gap at the threshold that opens to the outside.”

“Floor and wall junctures were not covered in the food preparation/storage/warewashing areas or the bathroom. The entire establishment has no cove molding.”

Combine those two, and you have an invitation for rodents to make like Henry Hill escorting his date into the Copa. Then, they start to make themselves at home by leaving “gnaw marks on three cabbage bags inside the walk-in cooler.”

Other things Pixie & Dixie left included over 15 poop pellets on the walk-in cooler floor; four pellets on the floor under the three-compartment sink, three on the floor behind the soda reach-in cooler, and two on the floor under the front counter.

Yet even with the restaurant’s running of the rodents, staff left clean to-go container on the floor near the kitchen entrance.

“Cardboard used to line food-contact shelves” as in “soiled cardboard used as liners next to the coffee machine.”

Standing water covered the floors “throughout the kitchen and walk-in cooler.”

The pikliz container and black bean container in the walk-in cooler was cracked.

“Containers of sugar were heavily soiled by the coffee machine.”

Pack remained closed after the first re-inspection because about 25 rodent droppings were on the walk-in cooler floor and four were behind a cookline table.

Pack passed the second re-inspection.

Pickles Pub Sandbar, 511 Greene St., Key West

Routine inspection, 24 total violations, six high priority violations

Ice buckets sat on the bar area floor.

Multiple boxes of single-service items sat on the floor of an upstairs dry storage room.

Rodents left over 15 doo dots on a shelf where pizza boxes are stored and over 20 on a deli slicer under a pizza prep area table.

Over 100 flies clogged the air, “landing on soda boxes, clean plates, napkins, a bottle of grenadine, clean pitchers and clean cups inside the server station near the bar.”

A dead roach was spotted.

A storage container was “heavily soiled with old food debris where clean pizza pans are stored under pizza ovens.”

The inspector “observed the floor was heavily soiled in the pizza prep area, and the floor in the server station was soiled with a slime-like substance.”

The pizza prep area’s reach-in cooler was “heavily soiled” inside. The walk-in cooler shelves were “soiled.”

Standing water stood under the server room’s soda machine.

An employee “handled raw chicken, changed gloves, then began to handle clean equipment without washing hands.”

Another employee “grabbed the trash can, then handled pizza paddle to plate pizza without changing gloves and washing hands.”

Plato Loco, 1414 Lucerne Ave., Lake Worth Beach

Routine inspection, five total violations, two high priority violations

This was all about the roaches.

Dead: five under the three-compartment sink, two on the floor in front of a reach-in freezer, and one on the kitchen floor.

Alive: One on the floor in front of a reach-in freezer, one on a kitchen prep sink’s leg, and one on a wall under the kitchen handwash sink.

Regular: “Roach excrement and/or droppings were present inside of an unused ice machine in the kitchen area.”

Sugar Bae, 8253 Sunset Strip, Sunrise

Routine inspection, six total violations, four high priority violations

Six living roaches were spotted in the kitchen dishwasher. Another six were under a food warmer. Seven hid under a kitchen chest freezer while five crawled on the wall next to the three-compartment sink.

Cheese (50 degrees) and cooked potatoes (49 degrees) weren’t cool enough for safe keeping or serving. Stop Sale.

One handwash sink had no soap. One had no paper towels.

Tacombi, 3930 NE Second Ave., Miami

Complaint inspection, 11 total violations, four high priority violations

Not often you find a financial violation on an inspection: “Establishment is charging automatic gratuity without properly disclosing the information on the menu and the bill.”

This Design District also had other issues. Rodents left 25 droppings under the dishwasher and three-compartment sink, 16 on the floor by the mop sink and under a try storage rack and 10 behind a bar area ice machine.

Eight flies were observed.

A cutting board by the prep area front counter “has cut marks and is no longer cleanable.”

The cookline handwash sink didn’t have paper towels or a blower.

This place did have a sanitizer bucket for wiping cloths, but had it at a soupy, goopy 400 parts per million. Staff diluted it to 200 parts per million.

Villa Pizza, Miami International Airport, near Gate D-44, Miami

Complaint inspection, 22 total violations, six high priority violations

Earlier this week, we told you about this MIA pizza place’s dirty food contact surfaces, food kept at dangerously warm temperatures and rodent dropping decorative touches.

READ MORE: Rodents, filth, unsafe food at this Miami International Airport food stop

This Villa Pizza, one of three at the airport, failed inspection Tuesday, but got it together in time for Wednesday morning’s re-inspection.

Yellow Tail Subs Grill, 27275 S. Dixie Hwy., South Miami-Dade

Complaint inspection, 32 total violations, eight high priority violations

The inspector first came by on Aug. 6.

You’re not supposed to have an insect control device over a food prep area, such as “at the drive-thru, the bug zapper was stored on top of soda machine” or “at the dry storage area, a bug zapper was stored on a shelf above bags of flour.”

The drive-thru area bug zapper had collected “an accumulation of dead flies and roaches.”

The walls were “soiled with accumulated grease, food debris, and/or dust. Observed throughout with dirty buildup, dead roaches and cobwebs and flies.”

Other roach corpses, about seven, were spotted on the cookline fire extinguisher. Four roaches died on a dishwashing shelf with clean containers. The cobweb dust was thick enough on the drive-thru window shelf that four roach bodies lay in there.

“One live roach crawling out of a box of parchment paper used to wrap food items.” Two roaches strutted “on the prep table where uncovered hot sauce containers were being prepped.” Four roaches sashayed across the cookline floor. Another quartet were in dry storage, “crawling on walls and shelves where flour bags are stored.”

Eight roaches “crawled out of the door frame” of the water heater closet. On that dishwashing area shelf, six roaches “crawled between cleaned containers.” One roach crawled from under a gyro machine. One shuffled across a flip-top cooler.

And the roaches on the dishwashing area shelves left over 100 droppings on the shelf and metal containers.

Six flies hung out in the drive-thru. But the real party was in the water heater room, where about 40 flies chilled on the walls.

Perhaps this helps explain the volume of insect vermin: The “exterior door has a gap at the threshold that opens to the outside,” a violation repeated at both exit doors.

Also, “hole in or other damage to the wall.” Where? “Observed throughout (the establishment).”

An in-use ice scoop sat “on a soiled soda grate at the drive-thru window.”

Similarly, “tongs and a grease cleaner spatula were stored on a soiled pipe at the cookline.”

In the rear dry storage area, where the flour lives, the inspector found an “objectionable odor.”

In the reach-in cooler, “containers of tilapia, shrimp and conch fritters were stored uncovered.” In dry storage, where some of the roaches gallivanted about, a “shelf bucket of dry seasoning was stored uncovered.”

The cook “coated raw chicken then proceeded to grab raw tilapia” without changing gloves and washing in his hands.

Another employee got the glove switching part down, but forgot the handwashing in the middle.

The walk-in cooler threshold was “covered with standing water.”

In the kitchen, three plastic gallons of hot sauce and a case of water were stored on the floor.”

All of the reach-in coolers and freezers sported a “buildup of food debris/soil residue on equipment door handles.”

The re-inspection wasn’t until four days later, Monday, when the inspector saw eight dead roaches, 12 live roaches and buckets of seasoning stored on the floor.

Tuesday’s second callback inspection, third inspection overall, got ruined by two dead roaches under a dry storage shelf and four live roaches in dry storage.

The restaurant passed a callback inspection on Aug. 12.

Yen’s Kitchen, 7364 Lake Worth Rd., Unincorporated Palm Beach County

Routine inspection, eight total violations, five high priority violations

On the cookline, 11 roaches danced on “electrical cables and wire metal shelves used to store cooked rice noodles.”

“Multiple areas” of the kitchen had standing water.

Wash, rinse, and sanitize covers the functions of the three-compartment sink. But come time for the big finish in compartment No. 3, the sanitizer measured zero parts per million.

Tuesday, re-inspection No. 1: Two live roaches.

Tuesday, Re-inspection No. 2: All clear.