Rodent droppings under sugar and flour containers, a dead roach near the hot buffet, and live roaches crawling inside boxes of trash bags plagued two restaurants temporarily ordered shut last week by state inspectors.
The South Florida Sun Sentinel typically highlights restaurant inspections in Broward and Palm Beach counties from the Florida Department of Business and Professional Regulation. We cull through hundreds of restaurant and bar inspections that happen weekly and spotlight places ordered shut for “high-priority violations,” such as improper food temperatures or dead cockroaches.
Sun Sentinel readers can browse full Palm Beach, Broward and Miami-Dade county reports through our state inspection map, updated weekly (usually Mondays) with fresh data pulled from the Florida DBPR website.
Any restaurant that fails a state inspection must stay closed until it passes a follow-up. If you spotted a possible violation and wish to file a complaint, contact Florida DBPR here. (But please don’t contact us: The Sun Sentinel doesn’t inspect restaurants.)
Singing Bamboo Chinese Restaurant, West Palm Beach
2845 N. Military Trail, No. 11
Ordered shut: May 31; reopened June 1
Why: 23 violations (six high-priority), led by 14 rodent droppings found “under sugar and flour containers” near the kitchen’s dry storage area, next to the “high-chair storage at wait station” in the dining room, and near the ice machine at the wait station. (The operator later cleaned and sanitized these areas.) The state also discovered “22 dead roaches on rodent glue trap underneath sugar storage container” by the dry storage area, prompting the operator to trash the roach traps. Inspectors also spotted one employee “with no hair restraint” while cooking chicken on the line; another employee who touched “raw chicken then proceeded to handle cooked chicken” without washing their hands first, and “multiple bottles of water on prep surfaces” that belonged to employees. They also saw “multiple containers of oil, soy sauce” and raw pork on the floor of the restaurant and walk-in freezer. Finally, the state red-flagged eggs and cooked chicken wings stored at improper temperatures, and although they weren’t ordered to trash them, the operator “voluntarily discarded” the eggs. The state uncovered a pair of basic issues during its June 1 follow-up inspection and cleared the restaurant to reopen. Singing Bamboo was last ordered shut March 29 for similar rodent dropping woes.
King Super Buffet, West Palm Beach
4270 Okeechobee Blvd.
Ordered shut: May 31; reopened June 1
Why: 22 violations (six high-priority), such as 15 live cockroaches found crawling “on chest freezer at hibachi station” and inside “box of white plastic trash bags.” The operator managed to kill some of them, according to the state’s report. Inspectors also uncovered one dead roach “on floor by hot buffet station in dining room.” The restaurant was ordered to stop selling and throw out a “severely dented can of Hunt’s tomato ketchup” as well as cooked chicken, pasta and dumplings due to temperature abuse. Finally, the state found kitchen “floor tiles missing and/or in disrepair” and walk-in cooler shelves and a paper towel dispenser “soiled with grease, food debris, dirt, slime or dust.” The Chinese buffet was cleared to reopen the next day after inspectors found zero new problems.
