Health Department’s Most Recent Inspections of Darien Restaurants Shows One With a ‘C’

Here’s how Darien restaurants and other food-serving places fared in the latest inspection reports, released Thursday by the Darien Health Department.

Editor’s note: With this article, Darienite.com has restarted the regular restaurant health ratings feature. As of publication time, the website with the health inspection reports is not online, so there are no links to individual reports. When that website goes back online, you can get the reports here.

The department on Thursday released 12 reports of inspection visits from Aug. 10 to 24. Of those, nine inspections resulted in an “A” rating. One establishment was rated “C” and on re-inspection was rated “B.” Another establishment also received a “B.”

Keep in mind that a food-serving establishment with a history of good ratings may occasionally get a poor inspection rating, occasionally the best do, and every restaurant normally gets a few things wrong.

Here’s an alphabetical list of the most recently released health inspection results (an explanation of how this list is put together is immediately below it):

— Aux Delices — Goodwives Shopping Center, 25 Old Kings Hwy. North — Aug. 22 — Town Rating: A — State Score: 96

— Burgers + Fries — 55 Old Kings Hwy. North — Aug. 24 — Town Rating: A — State Score: 97

— Clean Juice — Goodwives Shopping Center, 25 Old Kings Hwy. North — Aug. 15 — Town Rating: B — State Score: 91

— Duchess Family Restaurant  — 306 Post Road — Aug. 15 — Town Rating: A — State Score: 94

— Fjord Fish Market — 1015 Post Road — Aug. 22 — Town Rating: A — State Score: 95

— Godgitto — 1015 Post Road — Aug. 22 — Town Rating: A — State Score: 99

— Scena Wine Bar & Restaurant — 1077 Post Road — Aug. 24 — Town Rating: A — State Score: 94

— Senior Program at Mather Center — 2 Renshaw Road — Aug. 17 — Town Rating: A — State Score: 97

— Ten Twenty Post Oyster Bar& Bistro — 1020 Post Road — Aug. 24 — Town Rating: A — State Score: 93

— Thai Time — Goodwives Shopping Center, 25 Old Kings Hwy. North — Aug. 10 — Town Rating: C — State Score: 86 — VIOLATIONS: nine shelled eggs out on […] line equipment at room temperature, two separate bags of cooked rice noodles at 92 degrees and house-made garlic and oil [mix] at 89 degrees, all out on the line (NO customers or orders [at time of inspection]); no sanitizer set up anywhere in the kitchen (during inspection it was made [prepared]); several unclean utensils in storage; hot water was turned off – was turned on during inspection; no paper towel and soap not working at prep area hand sink; storing knives between counters – wedged; waste water pooling inside cold holding line unit; leak under the dish[washing] machine collecting in stainless bowl.” — INSPECTION COMMENTS: “New QFO [Qualified Food Operator] of one month […] Note: Replace worn red spatula—chipping on all sides, cover food in upright storage freezer, yellow wiping cloth should be in newly made sanitizer bucket, two stocks of moldy celery in walk-in [cooler] (disposed of), female employee only rinsed hands because the hand sink was not properly stocked (corrected).”

— Thai Time — Goodwives Shopping Center, 25 Old Kings Hwy. North — Aug. 23 — Town Rating: B — State Score: 89 — VIOLATIONS: “Pooling shelled eggs in bain marie on the line uncovered; no sanitizer set up for surface cleaning … corrected during inspection (bleach); yellow wet wiping cloth left on counter; thawing protein (fish) at room temperature; shelving under the stove, under microwave and under prep area shelving left unclean; leak under dish[washing] machine; strong smoke in the kitchen … fryer grease is burning and the hood was not turned on; personal items (tablet) left out on prep counters and flushable wipes stored on the top shelf of the bain marie in the kitchen.” — INSPECTION COMMENTS: “Eating in the kitchen upon entry and no hand washing before touching kitchen items during the inspection, hand washing reminder given! All food must be stored in NSF [National Sanitation Foundation Institute] approved bags/containers. Walk-in [cooler] is icing over … temperature is 44-47 [degrees] [which] is in the range, fix immediately. Some waste water in cook line bain marie. Some improvement from routine inspection. QFO [Qualified Food Officer] on site. No customers. Current rating not posted!”

— Tokeneke Club — 4 Butler’s Island Road — Aug. 17 — Town Rating: A — State Score: 97

Dates (normally in this regular weekly feature, but not as of publication time for this article) link to the food establishment’s inspection report referenced here (when available, sometimes it takes a while to get posted online), and Darien’s own A/B/C ratings link to a Web page showing several of the restaurant’s recent inspection ratings (those Web pages are also down as of publication time).

For restaurants and other food-serving establishments rated “C,” and for some others of interest to the public (like schools) additional information is given. When we provide that information here, then words within brackets (“[ ]”) have been added for clarity by Darienite.com. Each comment separated by semicolons is about a particular violation that triggers a deduction of one or more points (called “demerits”) from a perfect state score of 100.

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How Darien’s Food-Serving Places Are Rated

Restaurants in town are rated under the Darien Health Department’s own A/B/C ratings system. Health inspectors also use the state health code regulations to score restaurants, with a perfect score set at 100, and demerits (of 1 to 4 points each) for various code violations.

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The Darien system takes into account problems that are ongoing, so a restaurant scoring higher than others on the state scale may actually get a lower score on the Darien scale.

Any establishment actually deemed unsafe can be closed by the town Health Department until violations are fixed.