WINDERMERE, FL. The Little Greek restaurant on Old Brick Road was serving customers on July 10 while state inspectors were documenting eight separate high-severity violations, including a failure to maintain shellfish identification records and a failure to follow parasite destruction procedures for fish on the menu.
The restaurant was not closed.
What Inspectors Found
The shellfish records violation stands out. State rules require restaurants serving oysters, clams, or mussels to maintain shell stock identification tags that trace each batch to its harvest site and date. Inspectors found those records were inadequate.
The parasite destruction violation compounds the shellfish concern. Certain fish served raw or undercooked, including salmon and other species common on Greek-style menus, must be frozen to specific temperatures for specific durations before service to kill parasites. Inspectors found those procedures were not being followed.
No consumer advisory was posted to warn customers that raw or undercooked items were on the menu.
The person in charge was either absent or not performing duties during the inspection. An inspector also cited employees for not reporting symptoms of illness and for using improper handwashing technique. Food contact surfaces were not properly cleaned or sanitized, and food was found in poor condition, mislabeled, or adulterated.
All eight violations were high-severity. None were intermediate or basic. The restaurant was not closed.
What These Violations Mean
The shellfish traceability failure is not a paperwork issue. When a customer gets sick from a contaminated oyster or clam, health officials use shell stock tags to trace the batch back to its harvest bed and pull it from other restaurants. Without those records, that chain of investigation breaks. A sick customer has no recourse, and other customers at other locations may keep eating from the same contaminated harvest.
The parasite destruction failure is equally direct. Anisakis, a parasitic roundworm found in raw fish, causes severe abdominal pain, nausea, and vomiting when consumed alive. The standard protocol, freezing fish to minus four degrees Fahrenheit for seven days or equivalent, kills the parasite before it reaches a plate. When that protocol is skipped, the fish that reaches a customer may still carry a live parasite.
The illness reporting and handwashing violations work together to create a transmission pathway. An employee who does not report symptoms, and who then washes hands improperly, can deposit norovirus or other pathogens directly onto food or food contact surfaces. Norovirus spreads easily and causes rapid-onset vomiting and diarrhea, often affecting multiple people who ate the same meal.
The absence of a functioning person in charge during the inspection is significant. CDC data links establishments without active managerial control to three times more critical violations. On July 10 at Little Greek, every one of the eight violations found was critical.
The Longer Record
The July 10 inspection was not an anomaly. State records show 23 inspections on file for this location, with 255 total violations documented across that history.
The eight most recent inspections before July 10 each produced high-severity violations. The January 20, 2026 inspection found eight high and three intermediate violations. The January 28 follow-up found six high and five intermediate violations. The July 11, 2025 inspection found seven high and three intermediate violations. A follow-up three days later, on July 14, still found four high and two intermediate violations.
The pattern is consistent and specific. High-severity violations appeared in every single inspection going back through 2024. The location has never been emergency-closed.
The July 10, 2026 inspection produced the same high-severity count as the January 20, 2026 inspection: eight. In the six months between those two visits, the violation total did not improve.
Still Open
Florida's inspection system allows restaurants to remain open after high-severity violations if inspectors determine an emergency closure is not warranted. The threshold for emergency closure typically involves an immediate, acute threat, such as a sewage backup, no running water, or an active pest infestation.
Eight high-severity violations, including failures in shellfish traceability, parasite destruction, illness reporting, handwashing technique, food contact surface sanitation, and managerial oversight, did not meet that threshold on July 10.
Little Greek on Old Brick Road in Windermere was open for business that day, and the state record shows it remained open after the inspection concluded.
