OCOEE, FL. Toxic chemicals were improperly stored or labeled near food at Miwa Hibachi & Sushi Express on West Colonial Drive when a state inspector visited on August 25, 2026, one of seven high-severity violations documented that day. The restaurant was not closed.
The inspection turned up a total of 13 violations, seven of them high-severity and six intermediate. That tally is the worst single-inspection result in the facility's recorded history.
What Inspectors Found
Inspectors cited the restaurant for having no written employee health policy, meaning no formal system exists to keep sick workers out of the kitchen. That violation sits alongside a citation for improper handwashing technique, which inspectors noted separately, meaning workers were making attempts to wash their hands but doing so incorrectly.
Food contact surfaces were found not properly cleaned or sanitized. Cutting boards, prep surfaces, and similar equipment that touches food directly are primary transfer points for bacteria when not cleaned between uses.
The shellfish traceability violation is notable for a sushi operation. Inspectors cited inadequate shell stock identification records, meaning the origin of shellfish served at the restaurant could not be confirmed from documentation on hand.
There was also no consumer advisory posted for raw or undercooked foods, a standard disclosure required at any restaurant serving sushi, sashimi, or undercooked proteins. The advisory is specifically intended to warn elderly customers, pregnant women, and people with weakened immune systems.
The intermediate violations included inadequate cooling and cold holding equipment, single-use items being reused, improper waste disposal, inadequate ventilation and lighting, toilet facilities in inadequate condition, and equipment in poor repair.
What These Violations Mean
The chemical storage violation is the most immediately dangerous finding. When cleaning agents, sanitizers, or pesticides are stored near or above food without proper labeling, a single mislabeled container or accidental spill can contaminate food with substances that cause acute poisoning. At a restaurant that serves raw fish, where no cooking step would destroy a chemical contaminant, that risk is direct.
The combination of no employee health policy and improper handwashing technique is a compounding problem. A health policy is the mechanism that keeps a worker with Norovirus or Salmonella away from food preparation. When that policy doesn't exist, the only remaining barrier is handwashing. When handwashing technique is also cited as inadequate, both layers of protection are absent at the same time.
The time-as-public-health-control violation means food was being held in the temperature danger zone, between 41 and 135 degrees, without proper time tracking. At a sushi counter, where fish and rice are frequently held at room temperature rather than refrigerated, this is a direct pathway for bacterial growth. The intermediate citation for inadequate cooling equipment compounds this further: if the cold holding equipment cannot reach required temperatures, time tracking becomes the only control, and that control was also found to be failing.
The absence of a consumer advisory for raw and undercooked foods is a disclosure failure with a specific population at risk. Customers who are immunocompromised, pregnant, elderly, or very young are at elevated risk from raw shellfish and undercooked fish, and without the advisory, they have no information to make an informed choice.
The Longer Record
The August 2026 inspection is the worst in Miwa Hibachi & Sushi Express's documented history. The restaurant has 21 inspections on record and 148 total violations accumulated across those visits. It has never been emergency-closed.
The prior inspection record shows high-severity violations present at every visit going back to at least 2023. The March 2023 inspection produced six high-severity violations and two intermediate ones. The September 2023 visit found five high-severity violations. Three high-severity violations appeared in each of the four inspections conducted between February 2024 and September 2025.
The January 2026 inspection, just seven months before this one, produced only one high-severity and one intermediate violation, the lowest counts in the recent record. The August 2026 result, seven high-severity violations, represents a sharp reversal from that low point.
No single violation category appears to have been resolved and stayed resolved across inspection cycles. High-severity findings have been a consistent feature of this restaurant's record across three calendar years.
Open for Business
Florida's emergency closure authority is triggered when an inspector determines that conditions pose an immediate threat to public health. Seven high-severity violations, including toxic chemicals near food, no mechanism to keep sick workers out of the kitchen, untraceable shellfish, and failing cold holding equipment at a raw fish restaurant, did not meet that threshold on August 25, 2026.
Miwa Hibachi & Sushi Express on West Colonial Drive remained open after the inspection.
