Comments on: An Evening at B.B. King’s: Chuck Berry Upstages My Three-Meat Nachos

By: Anna

Anna — Fri, 19 Feb 2010 23:05:34 +0000

That should read, “virtually impossible to achieve a spotless inspection.”

By: Anna

Anna — Fri, 19 Feb 2010 23:04:35 +0000

You’re absolutely right. It’s virtually , which is why you’re allowed a certain number of violations before you are considered “actually” in trouble (although you do have to pay fines for those violations).

And not to beat this dead horse, but–BB Kings has cleaned up their act. Their Oct 2009 inspection was “passing” with 23 violations. A month earlier they scored a whopping 47 violations, including, “Evidence of, or live mice in facility’s food and/ or non-food areas.” Yummy.

By: Jason Roth

Jason Roth — Sat, 06 Feb 2010 13:01:35 +0000

For readers who may not know “the Pakistani place”, that refers to the restaurant you go to after closing down a bar, surveying your choices and opting against White Castle, and then getting into a taxi and directing the driver to take you to “the Pakistani place”. So far, only one taxi driver has actually known what I was talking about from that description. (Most seem to get their grub from Little India on Lexington Ave., so I often find myself acting as the shepherd leading them to greasy new pastures.) The “place” is actually called “Cuisine of Pakistan” and you can find my endorsement here.

I know you’re just joking about B.B. King’s, but just for the hell of it, I thought I would find out more about those health code violations. I recently downloaded an iPhone App called NYC Way and one of its many functions is the ability to check health code violations. After checking out the so-called “violations” of several of my local restaurants in Queens, I’m even more suspicious of the health code and health code inspectors than I am of the restaurants. For B.B. King’s, the worst thing listed is not that the food is improperly refrigerated, but that they did not “provide” an accurate thermometer. (I’m thinking “thermometer” translates to “payoff”.)

I then looked up restaurant Daniel to see if anything was listed. The last inspection date listed is 9/25/2008 and the violations include: “Food contact surface not properly maintained”. Hmm… maybe that’s an outlier for a top restaurant. Let’s try my favorite restaurant, Le Bernardin: “Food contact surface not properly maintained, or not washed, rinsed and sanitized after each use and following any activity when contamination may have occurred” (5/26/2009).

I think I will officially discount the mere existence of “health code violations” as having any import whatsoever. If someone sees a rat eating my dinner, on the other hand, please let me know.

By: Anna

Anna — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 22:45:59 +0000

Somehow I missed this one, so I’m behind the times. But better late than never. As a friend I’m obligated to tell you that B.B. Kings has been cited for severe health code violations multiple times. That may not have been pulled pork you were eating.

That said, I have eaten repeatedly at the Pakistani place. So I clearly am not a germophobe.