Cockroaches

My last post was about how much I hate bugs...so this is an appropriate topic. Today, I was eating lunch with some friends from work and we went to our usual place, Thaiphoon in Pentagon Row. We've been eating here at least 4 times a month for well over a year. They have good food, good service, and it looks clean.


Well looks can be deceiving. I found what I'm pretty sure was a cockroach in my fried rice. Gross, right? Yeah, it almost made me throw up. So I obviously didn't have to pay for it and they gave us an extra 20% off the bill - not enough in my opinion, but I just wanted to leave and didn't care about that. So I looked up the restaurant on the VA Dept. of Health's website and sure enough, they have a roach problem. Check out a few of the "critical violations" from their last inspection, on March 25th...how can a restaurant stay open with reports like these?

• Dead roaches are not removed from the premises at a frequency that prevented their accumulation, decomposition, or the attraction of other pests.


• Critical Repeat: The following food-contact equipment surfaces are not clean to sight and touch: 1. the lid on the ice machine 2. container used for ice scoop storage at waitstation 3. can opener 4. plates stored as clean were observed having dead and live roaches on them.


• Proper pest control methods are not used to minimize the presence of insects, rodents, and other pests found in the establishment. Roaches observed on shelf in kitchen where dishes are stored.

I would strongly recommend the use your local Dept. of Health's website prior to establishing a favorite restaurant. Here's a link to the Virginia Dept. of Health: http://www.healthspace.ca/vdh