CLERMONT, FL. State inspectors visiting Amore Italian Ristorante on S. Highway 27 on August 11 found food sourced from unapproved or unknown suppliers, meaning some ingredients on the menu that day had never passed a USDA or FDA safety inspection. The restaurant was not closed.
That single violation was one of eight high-severity citations inspectors recorded during the visit, along with four intermediate violations. By the time inspectors left, the record showed a facility with no written employee health policy, no consumer advisory for raw or undercooked foods, inadequate shell stock identification, improperly cleaned food contact surfaces, and at least one employee not reporting illness symptoms.
What Inspectors Found
The shell stock violation is notable for what it means about the restaurant's seafood. Shellfish, including oysters, clams, and mussels, are frequently eaten raw or lightly cooked. State rules require restaurants to maintain identification tags for each batch, so that if a customer gets sick, health officials can trace the source. Amore had inadequate records.
The food from unapproved sources violation compounds that concern. Without a documented supply chain, there is no way to know whether ingredients that reached customers on August 11 were ever inspected by a federal food safety agency.
No person in charge was present or performing duties during the inspection. That detail matters structurally. CDC data cited in the inspection record indicates establishments without active managerial control accumulate critical violations at three times the rate of those with it. Every other violation on this list is consistent with that baseline finding.
What These Violations Mean
The combination of no employee health policy and an employee actively not reporting illness symptoms is among the most direct transmission risks documented in food service inspections. Norovirus, which causes roughly 20 million illnesses in the United States annually, spreads primarily through infected food workers who either don't know they should stay home or work through symptoms anyway. A written health policy is the mechanism that closes that gap. Amore had neither the policy nor a worker following the protocol the policy would have required.
Improper handwashing technique makes that worse. Even when a worker goes through the motion of washing their hands, incorrect technique leaves pathogens in place. Combined with improperly cleaned food contact surfaces, which inspectors also cited, the result is a facility where contamination can move from a sick employee to a cutting board to a plate without meaningful interruption.
The improper sewage disposal violation adds a separate contamination vector. Raw sewage contains pathogens including E. coli and Hepatitis A. When waste water is not disposed of properly, those pathogens can reach food preparation surfaces.
The missing consumer advisory for raw or undercooked foods is a disclosure failure that falls hardest on the most vulnerable diners. Pregnant women, elderly customers, and people with compromised immune systems face elevated risk from undercooked proteins. Without the advisory, those customers had no way to make an informed choice about what they ordered.
The Longer Record
The August 11 inspection was not an outlier. State records show Amore has been inspected 11 times in total, accumulating 98 violations across those visits. The pattern holds across every inspection on record.
The most recent inspection before August 11 was April 15, 2026, when inspectors found nine high-severity violations and one intermediate. That visit was followed by a callback inspection the next day, April 16, which still found three high-severity violations. The December 30, 2025 inspection logged eight high-severity violations and two intermediates. February 28, 2024 produced eight high-severity violations and two intermediates. The facility has never been emergency-closed.
The August 11 inspection itself was followed by a callback on August 13, which found two high-severity violations and one intermediate still present. The restaurant reduced its violation count but did not clear the high-severity category entirely.
Of the eight inspections with recorded violation breakdowns before August 11, every single one included at least five high-severity citations. The lowest total in the prior record was six high-severity violations, logged in September 2023.
Still Open
Two days after inspectors documented food from an unapproved source, no employee illness policy, inadequate shellfish traceability records, and sewage disposal problems at Amore Italian Ristorante in Clermont, a follow-up inspection found the restaurant still carrying two high-severity violations.
The restaurant was not closed after the August 11 inspection. It was not closed after the August 13 callback. State records show 98 violations across 11 inspections and no emergency closure order in the facility's history.
