ORLANDO, FL. When state inspectors walked into La Bella Luna at 4886 New Broad St. on May 22, they found food sourced from unapproved or unknown suppliers, no written employee health policy, inadequate handwashing facilities, and shellfish with no traceability records. They wrote up eight high-severity violations. Then they left the restaurant open.
The inspection is one of the most serious on record for the New Broad Street location, which has now accumulated 242 total violations across 38 inspections.
What Inspectors Found
The food sourcing violation is among the most serious of the eight. Food from unapproved or unknown suppliers has not passed USDA or FDA inspection checkpoints, meaning there is no verified chain of custody if a customer gets sick. Inspectors also cited food in poor condition, described in state records as spoiled, contaminated, mislabeled, or adulterated.
Shellfish received a separate citation for inadequate identification records. The restaurant serves items that include shellfish consumed lightly cooked or raw, and without proper tagging records, health investigators have no way to trace the source if an illness is reported.
Toxic chemicals were found improperly stored or labeled, a violation that can result in acute poisoning if a chemical contaminates food through mislabeling or proximity. Food contact surfaces were also cited as improperly cleaned and sanitized, a direct cross-contamination pathway.
What These Violations Mean
The combination of no employee health policy and employees not reporting illness symptoms is, according to state health risk data, the leading cause of multi-victim foodborne outbreaks. Norovirus spreads with exceptional efficiency through a single infected food handler who continues working. Without a written policy requiring employees to report symptoms, there is no mechanism to remove a sick worker before they contaminate food.
Inadequate handwashing facilities compounds that risk. If the infrastructure for proper hand hygiene does not exist, proper hand hygiene does not happen, regardless of intent.
The food sourcing violation carries a different but equally serious risk. When food enters a kitchen from an unapproved supplier, it bypasses the inspection systems designed to catch Listeria, Salmonella, and E. coli contamination before it reaches a plate. If a customer becomes ill after eating at La Bella Luna, investigators tracing the source would hit a wall.
Improperly cleaned food contact surfaces, combined with multi-use utensils that were not properly washed, create conditions for bacterial biofilm buildup. Biofilms protect bacteria from standard sanitizing agents, meaning contamination can persist even after a surface appears clean.
The Longer Record
La Bella Luna's inspection history stretches back across 38 documented visits and 242 total violations, and the May 22 inspection is not an outlier. Six high-severity violations were recorded on November 7, 2025, resolved only when a follow-up inspection three days later showed zero violations. Before that, three high-severity violations appeared in March 2025, and four more in January 2024.
The pattern that emerges is one of recurring high-severity findings followed by correction, then recurrence. The restaurant has never been emergency-closed in its documented history, but it has cycled through high-severity violation counts multiple times across multiple years. The most recent inspection, with eight high-severity findings, is the steepest single-visit count in the recent record.
The shellfish traceability violation and the food sourcing violation are particularly notable in context. Both point to supply chain practices rather than in-kitchen errors, which means they are less likely to be corrected by cleaning crews working overnight.
Still Open
State inspectors documented ten violations on May 22, eight of them at the highest severity level the state assigns. Among those eight: food of unknown origin, no system for keeping sick workers out of the kitchen, and chemicals stored near food without proper labeling.
La Bella Luna was not closed.
The restaurant at 4886 New Broad St. continued operating after the inspection. As of the inspection date, no emergency closure order had been issued.