HIALEAH, FL. Back in April 2026, state inspectors walked into Mayajigua Restaurant Corp on W 16 Ave and found enough live roach activity to order the restaurant emptied by the following day.
The Florida Department of Business and Professional Regulation issued an emergency closure order on April 16, citing roach activity as the triggering violation. The facility was ordered vacated by April 17. Records show it was allowed to reopen that same morning at 9:27 a.m., after a follow-up inspection documented that the most serious violations had been addressed.
It was not the restaurant's first emergency closure.
What Inspectors Found
Mayajigua Restaurant Corp: Recent Inspection History
The April 16 inspection produced nine high-severity violations and four intermediate violations, the heaviest single-visit tally in the restaurant's recent history. Roach activity was the violation serious enough to trigger an immediate closure order under state law.
The inspection also documented food contact surfaces not properly cleaned or sanitized, and toxic chemicals improperly stored or labeled near food preparation areas. Among the intermediate violations, inspectors cited the reuse of single-use items and inadequate ventilation and lighting.
The follow-up inspection on April 17 showed two high-severity violations and two intermediate violations still on record, down from nine, which was enough for state inspectors to allow the doors to reopen.
What These Violations Mean
Live roach activity in a food service establishment is one of the conditions state law treats as an immediate threat to public health, and the reason is direct. Cockroaches carry pathogens including Salmonella, E. coli, and Listeria on their bodies and in their waste. They move between sewage, garbage, and food preparation surfaces without distinction. A customer eating food prepared in an active roach environment is eating food that may have been in contact with those surfaces.
The food contact surface violation compounds that risk. Cutting boards, prep tables, and utensils that are not properly cleaned and sanitized between uses are a transfer point for whatever contamination is present in the kitchen. When roach activity and improperly sanitized surfaces exist at the same time, the contamination pathway from pest to food becomes shorter.
The chemical storage violation at Mayajigua is a separate and acute hazard. Toxic cleaning chemicals stored near or above food, or without proper labeling, can cause direct chemical poisoning if they come into contact with food or are mistaken for food-safe products. It is not a background concern.
The reuse of single-use items, flagged as an intermediate violation, adds another contamination route. Gloves, cups, or utensils designed for a single use and then reused carry whatever they contacted the first time into the next preparation cycle.
The Longer Record
The April 2026 closure did not arrive without warning. Mayajigua Restaurant Corp has accumulated 230 violations across 26 inspections on record, a total that places this facility among the more heavily cited permanent food service operations in Miami-Dade County.
The restaurant's inspection history shows high-severity violations in every single visit documented in recent years. The February 2023 inspection produced seven high-severity and three intermediate violations, and records show a prior emergency closure connected to that period. The August 2023 inspection produced another seven high-severity violations. Neither of those visits appears to have produced a sustained improvement.
The pattern across eight inspections from 2023 through 2026 is consistent: high-severity violations present at every visit, intermediate violations alongside them, and totals that dipped in mid-2024 before climbing again. The April 2026 inspection, with nine high-severity violations, was the worst single-visit count in that stretch.
Twenty-six inspections and 230 total violations over the life of the facility is a cumulative record. The second emergency closure in April 2026 was not an isolated event in an otherwise clean history.
After the Closure
The restaurant was allowed to reopen on the morning of April 17, roughly 24 hours after the closure order was issued. The follow-up inspection confirmed the highest-priority violations had been resolved to the inspector's satisfaction, though two high-severity violations and two intermediate violations remained documented at the time of reopening.
What the April 17 inspection did not resolve is the pattern that produced nine high-severity violations in a single visit at a facility with two emergency closures and 230 violations on record. Whether the conditions that led to this closure have been genuinely corrected, or whether the next inspection will find the same categories of violations again, is not something the April 17 records answer.
The prior closure came in 2023. The second came three years later, in April 2026. The interval between them is a fact the inspection record leaves open.