HIALEAH, FL. State inspectors visiting New Dragon Restaurant at 5902 W 16th Ave on August 18, 2026 found that the restaurant was sourcing food from unapproved or unknown suppliers, meaning every ingredient from those sources had bypassed USDA and FDA safety inspections entirely before reaching customer plates.
That was one of ten high-severity violations documented in a single visit. The restaurant was not closed.
What Inspectors Found
The handwashing record alone drew two separate high-severity citations. Inspectors cited both inadequate handwashing by food employees and improper hand and arm washing technique as distinct violations, meaning workers were not only skipping steps but, when they did attempt to wash, were doing it incorrectly.
The restaurant also had no written employee health policy and no employee reporting symptoms of illness, two violations that regulators treat as separate failures. One means the policy never existed on paper. The other means a sick worker was present and did not disclose it.
Toxic chemicals were found improperly stored or labeled in proximity to food. Inspectors also cited food contact surfaces as not properly cleaned or sanitized, and documented that time was not being properly used as a public health control, a protocol that allows food to remain in the temperature danger zone only within strict time limits.
The restaurant had no consumer advisory posted for raw or undercooked menu items, and no allergen awareness was demonstrated by staff.
What These Violations Mean
Food from unapproved sources is one of the most serious violations in the Florida inspection code because it eliminates traceability. If a customer becomes sick, investigators cannot identify where the food originated, cannot issue a recall, and cannot determine how many other customers were exposed. The FDA and USDA inspection systems exist precisely to catch Listeria, Salmonella, and E. coli before food reaches a kitchen. Sourcing outside those systems removes that layer entirely.
The combination of no employee health policy and an employee not reporting illness symptoms is a documented outbreak pathway. Norovirus, the most common cause of foodborne illness in the United States, spreads directly from infected food workers to customers through contaminated food. A written health policy is the mechanism that tells workers when to stay home. Without it, and without reporting, a sick employee has no formal instruction to do anything differently.
Two handwashing violations on the same inspection report a compound failure. Improper technique means pathogens remain on hands even after a washing attempt. Studies show that correct handwashing, done properly, removes more than 99 percent of pathogens. Incorrect technique offers little meaningful protection. At New Dragon, inspectors found both that workers were not washing adequately and that when they did wash, they were not doing it correctly.
Improperly stored or labeled chemicals near food create a chemical poisoning risk that is separate from and in addition to the biological contamination risks documented elsewhere in the same report. Mislabeled chemicals can be mistaken for food-safe products. Proximity to food preparation areas creates the conditions for accidental contamination.
The Longer Record
The August 18 inspection was not an anomaly. State records show 22 inspections on file for New Dragon Restaurant, with 316 total violations accumulated across that history.
Every inspection in the past three years has included high-severity violations. The October 2024 visit produced eight high-severity violations. The March 2026 inspection found six. The November 2025 inspection found five high-severity violations alongside three intermediate ones.
The facility has never been emergency-closed despite that accumulation. The August 18 inspection, with ten high-severity violations, was the highest single-visit count in the recent record.
A follow-up inspection was conducted the next day, on August 19, and found two high-severity violations and three intermediate violations still present. The restaurant remained open after that visit as well.
The Longer Record in Context
Across eight documented inspections going back to February 2023, New Dragon has not completed a single visit without at least five high-severity violations, with one exception: the August 19 callback, which showed two. That callback did not result in a clean bill of health.
The violations cited on August 18, including food from unapproved sources, no employee illness reporting, and no allergen awareness, are not new-construction growing pains or administrative paperwork gaps. They are operational failures that recur across years of state oversight.
Three hundred sixteen violations over 22 inspections averages to more than 14 violations per visit. The restaurant has never been closed.
As of the most recent state records available, New Dragon Restaurant at 5902 W 16th Ave in Hialeah remained open for business.
