LAKE CITY, FL. Back in January 2026, a state inspector walked into Love's Travel Stop #724 on a routine FDACS sanitation check and found a mold-like substance growing inside the bin of the Hardee's kitchen ice machine, grease-caked hood vents above the grill, and a meat slicer on a storage shelf with visible food debris built up on its blade and surfaces.
The inspection, conducted on January 7, 2026, turned up eight violations across the travel stop's Hardee's kitchen, deli, and dining areas. None were classified as priority violations, but one was a repeat, and none were corrected before inspectors arrived.
What Inspectors Found
The mold finding was in the Hardee's kitchen ice machine, where inspectors documented a "buildup of mold like substance inside bin of ice machine." That was corrected on site. In the dining room, inspectors also found "buildup of debris on and around soda nozzles and ice chute," which was also cleaned during the visit.
The deli slicer was a more pointed concern. Inspectors found it sitting on a storage shelf with "buildup of food debris" on its food-contact surface. A slicer stored dirty, rather than being cleaned after each use, can transfer bacteria from one product to the next across every customer order. That item was also moved to the sink and cleaned during the inspection.
The handwashing sink next to the walk-in cooler in the Hardee's kitchen had no paper towels available when inspectors arrived. Towels were placed at the sink during the inspection.
Beyond those corrected items, the inspector flagged grease buildup on the removable hood vent above the grill station, dust and debris on top of the fry hot-holding station, debris on the edges of rolling racks inside the walk-in cooler, and debris on door gaskets of the deli's make-line reach-in cooler. Old labels were stuck to pans stored on clean dish racks in both the Hardee's kitchen and the deli. The spray nozzle of the Hardee's three-compartment sink had a buildup of debris as well.
The Repeat Violation
The plumbing citation was marked repeat. Inspectors noted that the mop sink in the Hardee's kitchen was "missing backflow prevention device after splitter," a problem categorized as a Priority Foundation violation. It had not been corrected before this visit despite appearing in prior inspection records.
A backflow prevention device on a mop sink is not a technicality. Without it, contaminated water from the mop sink can be drawn back into the potable water supply under certain pressure conditions. The fact that this specific deficiency appeared again in January 2026 means it was identified before and still had not been fixed.
That violation was not corrected on site during the January inspection.
What These Violations Mean
For anyone who stopped at this Love's Travel Stop in January 2026 to grab a fountain drink, a deli order, or ice for a cooler, several of the findings were directly relevant to what they were consuming. Mold inside an ice machine bin means any ice dispensed from that machine before the inspection could have carried mold contamination. The same applies to the soda nozzles and ice chute in the dining room, where debris buildup creates surfaces where bacteria accumulate between uses.
The deli slicer finding carries a specific risk in a retail food setting. A slicer with dried food debris is not sanitary between cuts, and in a travel stop deli that serves multiple customers throughout the day, that translates into cross-contamination potential across every order until the equipment is cleaned.
The missing ice microbial test is a records and oversight issue. FDACS requires that packaged ice and ice used in food service be tested by an approved laboratory within a set window. No current test was on file at the time of inspection. That means there was no recent laboratory confirmation that the ice being used or sold met microbial safety standards.
The repeat plumbing violation is a systemic concern. A Priority Foundation citation means it affects the underlying conditions that support food safety, not just a surface-level cleanliness issue. Finding it again signals that whatever corrective action was taken after the prior citation did not hold.
The Longer Record
This was not a facility with a long history of serious problems. FDACS records show three prior inspections at this location going back to November 2022, and the violation counts had been low: four violations in November 2022, two in July 2024, and a clean focused inspection in February 2026, the follow-up visit that found zero violations.
The February 2026 check-back, conducted about five weeks after the January inspection, confirmed that the outstanding issues had been resolved. The facility met sanitation inspection requirements at that follow-up.
Still, the January 7 inspection documented eight violations, including one that had been cited before and still was not corrected when inspectors walked in. The ice microbial test, which requires advance planning rather than an on-site fix, was not available that day and was not among the items corrected during the visit.