TAMPA, FL. Back in January 2026, a state inspector walked into M Tea And Coffee on Tampa's specialty food strip and found tapioca sitting in a hot holding unit at 109 degrees Fahrenheit, a full 26 degrees below the 135-degree minimum required to keep it safe.
The inspector's notes read plainly: "Internal temperature of tapioca recently placed in hot holding unit measures 109 F." The tapioca was rapidly reheated to 165 degrees for 15 seconds before being returned to temperature control, and the hot holding unit itself was verified to be in working condition. The fix happened on the spot, but the gap was documented.
That single finding was part of an 11-violation inspection conducted by the Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services on January 23, 2026. The shop, a specialty food establishment selling tea, coffee, and tapioca-based drinks, met sanitation inspection requirements by the end of the visit, but the record of what inspectors found before corrections were made is detailed.
What Inspectors Found
Beyond the temperature violation, the inspector found the handwashing sink in the food prep area had no soap. That was corrected during the visit when soap was provided. The shop also had no probe thermometer on the premises at all, a gap that matters in a shop where temperature control is central to the product. A probe thermometer was obtained during the inspection.
The warewashing area had no sanitizer test strips, meaning staff had no way to verify that their sanitizer solution was at the correct concentration. Test strips were obtained before the inspector left.
The person in charge was unable to correctly respond to questions relating to foodborne illnesses. The inspector reviewed the Employee Health Policy with that person during the visit. The establishment also had no written procedures for responding to a vomiting or diarrheal event. Information on written procedures was provided to the person in charge during inspection.
Utensils in the food prep area were found stored in stagnant water measuring 54 degrees. The inspector noted they were properly cleaned and sanitized during the inspection before being stored in a clean, dry container.
The reach-in freezer had heavy ice buildup inside. Old food buildup was documented on the handle of that same freezer, and old spills were found inside a reach-in prep cooler. A food employee was observed without a hair or beard restraint. The toppings cooler had no ambient air thermometer inside, leaving staff with no way to monitor the temperature of that unit passively.
What These Violations Mean
The tapioca temperature finding is the most direct food safety concern in this inspection record. Foods held in the temperature range between 41 and 135 degrees, what regulators call the danger zone, can support rapid bacterial growth. Tapioca is a starchy, moist product that bacteria find hospitable. At 109 degrees, the product had been in dangerous territory long enough to register on the inspector's thermometer. The fact that the hot holding unit was working correctly means the problem was in how the product was placed and monitored, not in the equipment itself.
The absence of a probe thermometer compounds that risk in a specific way. Without one on hand, staff at M Tea And Coffee had no practical way to verify internal temperatures of any product before serving it. That gap is not theoretical. The inspector found it on the same day the tapioca was out of range.
No soap at the handwashing sink is a direct barrier to one of the most basic contamination controls in any food environment. In a shop where staff handle both raw tapioca and finished drinks served to customers, hand hygiene is not optional. The inspector found the sink without soap and corrected it, but the question of how long it had been that way is not answered by the inspection record.
The person in charge's inability to answer questions about foodborne illness prevention reflects a gap in operational knowledge that touches everything else on the list. A manager who cannot correctly describe illness transmission or prevention protocols is less likely to catch temperature drift, enforce handwashing, or respond correctly if an employee comes to work sick.
The Longer Record
M Tea And Coffee: Inspection History
M Tea And Coffee has two FDACS inspections on record at this location. The first, a preoperational inspection in November 2024, turned up three violations and the shop met requirements before opening. The January 2026 visit was the first full sanitation inspection, and it found 11 violations, none of them repeats from the prior visit.
The jump from three violations at preoperational to eleven at the first sanitation inspection is notable. Preoperational inspections evaluate readiness to open. Sanitation inspections evaluate how a facility actually operates. The gap between those two snapshots, about 14 months, produced a record that included a priority temperature violation, four priority foundation violations, and a person in charge who could not correctly answer basic foodborne illness questions.
None of the January violations were marked as corrected on site in the aggregate sense. Several individual items were resolved during the inspection, including the tapioca reheating, the soap, the probe thermometer, and the test strips. The heavy ice buildup in the reach-in freezer, the old food buildup on equipment surfaces, the missing ambient thermometer in the toppings cooler, and the employee without a hair restraint were not listed as corrected before the inspector left.