WEST PALM BEACH, FL. A state inspector walked into Havana on S Dixie Highway on August 3 and found food from unapproved or unknown sources being served to customers, a violation that means the restaurant was using ingredients that had bypassed federal safety inspections entirely.
That was one of eight high-severity violations documented that day. The restaurant was not closed.
What Inspectors Found
The food sourcing violation was not the only one that put customers at direct risk. Inspectors also cited the restaurant for failing to cook food to the required minimum temperature. Salmonella in poultry survives below 165 degrees Fahrenheit, and undercooked food reaching a customer's plate is one of the most direct routes from a kitchen failure to a hospital visit.
Inspectors also found inadequate shell stock identification records. Havana is a Cuban restaurant, and shellfish, including oysters and clams, are high-risk foods that are sometimes consumed raw or lightly cooked. Without proper tagging records, there is no way to trace a contaminated batch back to its source if customers become ill.
Toxic chemicals were found improperly stored or labeled. That violation sits alongside the food sourcing and temperature citations as an acute, immediate hazard rather than a paperwork deficiency.
The remaining high-severity violations clustered around illness transmission. The restaurant had no written employee health policy. Employees were not reporting symptoms of illness. Inspectors documented improper hand and arm washing technique, meaning that even when employees made an attempt to wash their hands, the technique left pathogens behind. There was also no consumer advisory posted for raw or undercooked foods, which is required so that elderly diners, pregnant women, and people with compromised immune systems can make an informed choice.
The single intermediate violation was for multi-use utensils not properly cleaned.
What These Violations Mean
Food from unapproved sources is not a labeling technicality. It means the ingredients in question never passed through USDA or FDA inspection checkpoints, so there is no documented chain of custody. If a customer gets sick, investigators cannot trace the food back to a farm, a processor, or a distributor. The violation eliminates the traceability that makes outbreak investigations possible.
The combination of no employee health policy and employees not reporting illness symptoms is what state epidemiologists call an outbreak enabler. Norovirus, the pathogen responsible for the majority of restaurant-linked outbreaks in the United States, spreads most efficiently when sick food workers continue handling food without restriction. A written health policy is the mechanism that gives employees both the instruction and the protection to stay home when symptomatic. Without one, there is no formal barrier between a sick worker and a customer's plate.
The improper handwashing citation compounds that risk. Studies of foodborne illness transmission consistently show that technique failures, not just skipped handwashing, account for a significant share of pathogen transfer in commercial kitchens. An employee who goes through the motions but does not wash for the required duration or cover all surfaces of the hands can spread contamination as effectively as one who skips the sink entirely.
Improperly stored or labeled toxic chemicals represent a separate and immediate hazard. Mislabeled chemicals stored near food preparation areas have caused acute poisoning incidents when they were mistaken for food-safe products or when containers leaked onto food contact surfaces.
The Longer Record
The August 3 inspection was not the first time Havana has drawn serious citations. State records show 30 inspections on file for this location, with 140 total violations accumulated across that history.
The pattern in recent years is uneven but persistent. In September 2024, inspectors found four high-severity and three intermediate violations. That inspection was followed one day later by a clean re-inspection. In March 2025, the restaurant passed with no violations, but two days before that clean inspection, a separate visit had turned up two high-severity and one intermediate violation. In July 2025, three high-severity violations were cited. In November 2025, one high-severity violation was documented.
None of those prior inspections triggered an emergency closure. The restaurant has no emergency closures on record across its entire 30-inspection history.
August 3 produced the worst single-day tally in the recent record, eight high-severity violations in one visit. That is double the count from the previous worst recent inspection in September 2024, and it arrived less than nine months after the restaurant's most recent high-severity citation.
Open for Business
Florida's emergency closure authority is triggered when an inspector determines that conditions pose an immediate threat to public health. Eight high-severity violations at Havana on August 3 did not meet that threshold, at least not in the inspector's determination on that day.
The restaurant remained open. Customers who walked in after the inspection had no way of knowing that the food on their plates may have come from a source that bypassed federal safety inspections, or that the kitchen had no written policy requiring sick employees to stay home.
That is where the record stands.
