NORTH MIAMI BEACH, FL. Food at Jerusalem Kosher Pizza on NE 167th Street was not being cooked to the required minimum temperature when state inspectors arrived on September 28, 2026, a violation that means pathogens like Salmonella can survive in poultry served directly to customers. That was one of ten high-severity violations documented in a single visit. The restaurant was not closed.
The inspection also found that employees were not reporting symptoms of illness and that the facility had no adequate employee health policy in place. Inspectors cited both improper handwashing and improper handwashing technique as separate high-severity violations, meaning workers were either skipping the sink entirely or going through the motions in a way that left pathogens on their hands.
Toxic chemicals were improperly stored or labeled, putting them in proximity to food. Food was found in poor condition, mislabeled, or adulterated. Food contact surfaces had not been properly cleaned or sanitized. The restaurant also lacked a consumer advisory for raw or undercooked foods, and required procedures for specialized processes were not being followed.
Two intermediate violations rounded out the inspection: multi-use utensils not properly cleaned, and inadequate ventilation and lighting.
What These Violations Mean
The undercooking violation is the most direct path to a sick customer. Salmonella in poultry survives below 165 degrees Fahrenheit, and if the food coming out of the kitchen at Jerusalem Kosher Pizza was not reaching that threshold, anyone who ate it was eating the risk.
The employee illness violations compound that danger in a specific way. Food workers who don't report symptoms, and a kitchen that has no written policy requiring them to, are the documented primary cause of multi-victim outbreaks. Norovirus spreads person-to-person through exactly this mechanism. When inspectors found both the policy failure and the symptom-reporting failure on the same visit, they were documenting two links in the same chain.
Improper handwashing and improper technique were cited as two distinct violations, which matters. The first means some employees were not washing their hands when they should have. The second means that even when a washing attempt was made, the technique left pathogens behind. Together, they describe a kitchen where contamination from workers' hands was not being interrupted at any reliable point.
The toxic chemical citation adds a separate category of risk. Improperly stored or unlabeled chemicals near food can cause acute poisoning through contamination or mislabeling, with no warning to the customer who orders the next slice.
The Longer Record
The September 28 inspection did not come out of nowhere. State records show Jerusalem Kosher Pizza has accumulated 226 violations across 25 inspections on record, and the facility has never been emergency-closed.
The inspection history shows a pattern of serious violations cycling without resolution. On August 20, 2024, inspectors documented 9 high-severity violations and 3 intermediate ones. A follow-up visit a week later, on August 27, still produced 3 high-severity violations and 2 intermediate ones. The kitchen improved enough by December 2024 to post two consecutive inspections with zero high-severity violations, but by August 2025 the count was back to 3 high-severity violations, and by the following September it had climbed to 10.
The day after the September 28 inspection, on September 29, 2026, inspectors returned and found 5 high-severity violations and 1 intermediate, meaning roughly half the serious violations from the prior visit remained unresolved within 24 hours.
The facility has never been emergency-closed in its inspection history. That is a fact the 226 violations on record sit alongside.
The Violations in Context
Ten high-severity violations in a single inspection is a significant number. For comparison, the August 2024 visit that produced 9 high-severity violations was the previous worst single-inspection result in the facility's recent history. The September 28, 2026 inspection exceeded it.
The combination of violations documented on that visit is notable not just for its length but for what the items represent together: a kitchen where food may not be fully cooked, where sick workers may not be staying home or reporting symptoms, where handwashing is both skipped and performed incorrectly, where cleaning surfaces and utensils are not being properly sanitized, and where chemicals are not safely separated from food.
Each of those violations, individually, is classified as high-severity by the state. All ten were present at once.
Jerusalem Kosher Pizza on NE 167th Street was open for business when inspectors left on September 28, 2026.
