FORT LAUDERDALE, FL. Food was not cooked to the required minimum temperature at Las Carnitas Inc. on West Davie Boulevard when state inspectors arrived on July 8, 2026, one of six high-severity violations documented during a single visit to the Fort Lauderdale restaurant.
The facility was not closed.
What Inspectors Found
Inspectors cited the restaurant for six high-severity and four intermediate violations across a range of concerns that touched nearly every stage of food handling, from preparation through service. The high-severity list included inadequate handwashing by food employees, food contact surfaces not properly cleaned or sanitized, and inadequate shell stock identification records.
Two violations addressed the same failure from different angles. The restaurant had no employee health policy, or an inadequate one, and separately, employees were found not reporting symptoms of illness. Together, those two citations describe a workplace where a sick employee had no formal obligation to stay home and no system requiring them to report symptoms in the first place.
The intermediate violations added structural problems to the picture. Inspectors documented improper sewage or wastewater disposal, inadequate cooling and cold-holding equipment, inadequate ventilation and lighting, and inadequate or improperly maintained toilet facilities.
What These Violations Mean
The undercooked food citation is among the most direct threats to anyone who ate at the restaurant that day. Salmonella in poultry survives below 165 degrees Fahrenheit. A single serving of meat pulled from heat too early can deliver a bacterial load sufficient to cause serious illness, and unlike a visible problem, there is no way for a customer to identify undercooked food by sight or smell once it is plated.
The two illness-reporting violations compound that risk in a specific way. When a facility has no written health policy and employees are not reporting symptoms, the kitchen has no mechanism to remove a sick worker from food handling. Norovirus is transmitted through contaminated hands in contact with food, and a single infected employee working a full shift can expose every customer served that day.
The shell stock traceability failure raises a different category of concern. Shellfish such as oysters, clams, and mussels are consumed raw or lightly cooked, meaning they carry no cooking step to kill pathogens. Without proper identification tags and records, there is no way to trace a batch of shellfish back to its harvest location if customers become ill. That traceability gap is not a paperwork problem, it is the difference between a contained outbreak and one that investigators cannot source.
Improper sewage disposal, cited as an intermediate violation, creates the risk of fecal contamination spreading through the facility. Combined with inadequate toilet facilities and documented failures in handwashing, the July 8 inspection describes a kitchen where the basic infrastructure for hygiene was compromised at multiple points simultaneously.
The Longer Record
The July 2026 inspection was not an anomaly. State records show Las Carnitas Inc. has been inspected 32 times and has accumulated 302 total violations across that history, with no prior emergency closures.
The pattern of high-severity citations is consistent across multiple years. In September 2023, inspectors documented nine high-severity and four intermediate violations in a single visit, the worst single-inspection result on record for the facility. In December 2025, five high-severity violations were cited. In August 2025, the restaurant was inspected three times within nine days: a clean visit on August 27 followed a five-high-severity inspection on August 18 and a single high-severity citation on August 20.
Las Carnitas Inc.: Recent Inspection History
That rhythm, high-severity violations, a clean or reduced follow-up, then high-severity violations again, has repeated across at least five inspection cycles. The categories also recur. High-priority food handling and employee illness concerns have appeared across multiple years, not as isolated findings but as a thread running through the facility's inspection record.
The July 8 inspection produced the highest single-visit high-severity count since the September 2023 visit. Six high-severity violations in one inspection, at a facility with 302 total violations across 32 inspections, is a number that fits a pattern rather than interrupting one.
Las Carnitas Inc. on West Davie Boulevard was serving customers when inspectors arrived on July 8, 2026. It was still serving customers when they left.
