Worst Rating — ‘C’ — for One Food-Serving Establishment in Latest Health Inspection Reports

One Darien food-serving establishment received a “C” rating, the worst in the town’s A-B-C ratings system, in the most recently released inspection reports from the town Health Department.

The 14 inspections took place from July 5 to 16. Nine inspections resulted in “A” ratings (the best), three more resulted in “B” ratings, and one inspection report was for  a snack bar, and the Health Department doesn’t give out town ratings for those.

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):

—Burgers Plus Pies — 55 Old Kings Hwy. North — July 15 — Town Rating: B — State Score: 89

—Convent at St. Birgitta — 4 Runkenhage Road — July 10 — Town Rating: A — State Score: 96

—Country Club of Darien — 300 Mansfield Ave. — July 16 — Town Rating: C — State Score: 81 — Inspector’s Remarks: “Documentation needed for staff working in prep area; thermometers missing in cold-holding units; no sanitizer set up in back prep area (very active prep area); wiping cloths left on the counters unclean in back prep; three unclean tongs hanging on the slice, break slicer down and sanitize, pasta maker, sou vide wand; labeling violation in various parts of the kitchen, shellfish tag not left with walk-in product (clams); improper thawing of proteins [meat?] in prep sink; two wooden cutting boards in poor repair, spatulas hanging on line chipped, chips on white dishes used for dinner service on the line; unclean non-food-contact surfaces; presence of pests observed in the kitchen (please provide this office with the last TX invoice); unclean on the line floor, under equipment and freezer walk-in floor … some tiles broken; several ceiling tiles missing in dry storage … water dripping down onto floor.” — Inspector’s Comments: “Quat [sanitizer] and bleach should not be stored side by side in downstairs dry storage!!! Emphasis must be placed on hand washing and glove use.”

—Country Club of Darien Snack Bar — 300 Mansfield Ave. — July 9 — Town Rating: none given — State Score: 95

—Country Club of Darien Satellite Kitchen — 300 Mansfield Ave. — July 16 — Town Rating: A — State Score: 94

—Dunkin Donuts — Darien South rest stop, Interstate 95 — July 12 — Town Rating: A — State Score: 94

—Heights Pizza — 882 Post Road — July 8 — Town Rating: A — State Score: 93

—McDonald’s — Darien South rest stop, Interstate 95 — July 12 — Town Rating: A — State Score: 97

—Palmer’s Supermarket — 264 Heights Road — July 8 — Town Rating: B — State Score: 88

—Sbarro — Darien South rest stop, Interstate 95 — July 12 — Town Rating: B — State Score: 89

— Subway — Darien South rest stop, Interstate 95 — July 12 — Town Rating: A — State Score: 99

—Taco Bell — Darien South rest stop, Interstate 95 — July 12 — Town Rating: A — State Score: 96

— Trader Joe’s — 436 Post Road — July 15 — Town Rating: A — State Score: 94

—The Waters Edge at Giovanni’s — 2748 Post Road — July 5 — Town Rating: A — State Score: 92

Dates 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.

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; semicolons (“;”) separate individual comments by the inspectors. Each comment separated by semicolons is about a particular violation that triggers a deduction of one or more points from a perfect state score of 100.

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See also:

• Our previous article showing restaurant inspection ratings (July 11)
  
• STAMFORD online health inspection results
• NORWALK online health inspection ratings (explanation of ratings)

You can find the past several inspection ratings under the Darien ratings system for food-serving establishments along with copies of inspection reports, including state health code scores on this website.

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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. Town Health Director David Knauf says that has never happened in the time he’s been with the department.