DELRAY BEACH, FL. Food at Geronimo Tequila Bar and Southwest Grill on East Atlantic Avenue was not being cooked to the minimum required temperature when a state inspector walked in on August 18, a violation that means customers may have been served poultry or other proteins that could harbor live Salmonella or Campylobacter. The restaurant was not closed.
That single violation was one of six high-severity citations the inspector recorded that day. When the full list is read together, it describes a kitchen operating without the basic controls that prevent customers from getting sick.
What Inspectors Found
The inspector found no consumer advisory posted for raw or undercooked foods, meaning customers who are elderly, pregnant, or immunocompromised had no way of knowing certain menu items carried elevated risk.
Employees were not following proper hand and arm washing technique. That citation does not mean workers skipped handwashing entirely; it means the technique was wrong enough that pathogens could remain on hands that appeared to have been washed.
Food contact surfaces were not properly cleaned or sanitized. Cutting boards, prep tables, and similar surfaces that touch raw proteins can transfer bacteria to every item prepared on them afterward.
The inspector also cited staff for not reporting illness symptoms, and found that no qualified person in charge was present or performing supervisory duties. Two intermediate violations rounded out the inspection: multi-use utensils were not properly cleaned, and single-use items were being reused.
The restaurant remained open after the August 18 inspection. A follow-up visit the next day, August 19, found one remaining high-severity violation.
What These Violations Mean
The undercooked food citation is the most direct threat to anyone who ate at Geronimo on August 18. Salmonella in poultry survives below 165 degrees Fahrenheit. Campylobacter, another bacteria common in undercooked chicken, is one of the leading causes of foodborne illness in the United States. Customers who ordered chicken or other proteins that day had no way of knowing whether their food had reached a safe internal temperature.
The illness-reporting failure compounds that risk. When employees do not report symptoms like vomiting or diarrhea, a sick worker can contaminate food directly before anyone in management is aware there is a problem. Food workers are the number one source of Norovirus transmission in restaurant outbreaks. Combined with the finding that no qualified person in charge was present, there was no one positioned to catch either problem before food reached the table.
Improperly cleaned food contact surfaces create a secondary contamination route. Bacterial biofilms can form on utensils and prep surfaces within 24 hours of inadequate cleaning. Once a biofilm establishes, it is significantly harder to remove than fresh contamination, meaning the problem can persist across multiple service periods.
The missing consumer advisory is a specific harm to the most vulnerable diners. Pregnant women, elderly customers, young children, and people on immunosuppressive medications face far higher hospitalization rates from foodborne illness than healthy adults. A posted advisory is the only mechanism that gives those customers the information they need to make a different choice.
The Longer Record
The August 18 inspection did not happen in a vacuum. State records show Geronimo Tequila Bar has 30 inspections on file and 135 total violations across its history, including one prior emergency closure.
That closure came on January 27, 2022, when inspectors found roach activity serious enough to shut the restaurant down. It reopened the following day.
The inspection record since then shows a facility that cycles between cleaner visits and significant violation spikes. On March 9, 2026, inspectors recorded seven high-severity violations and one intermediate. A follow-up the next day, March 10, still showed three high-severity citations. The December 2025 visit was clean on high-severity violations. Then August 18 arrived with six.
The April 2023 inspection logged four high-severity and four intermediate violations. The pattern across three-plus years is not a single bad day. It is a facility that clears violations after scrutiny and then accumulates them again.
Still Open
Florida law gives inspectors the authority to order an emergency closure when conditions pose an immediate threat to public health. Six high-severity violations, including undercooked food and an absent person in charge, did not meet that threshold at Geronimo on August 18.
The restaurant served customers that evening.
