MIAMI, FL. In April 2026, state inspectors walked into a popular Miami ceviche restaurant and found that the kitchen had not followed parasite destruction procedures for its fish, that food was coming from unapproved or unknown sources, and that no one on the floor was performing the duties of a person in charge. The restaurant, Pisco y Nazca Ceviche Gastrobar at 8551 NW 53 St, was not closed.
The April 13 inspection produced six high-severity violations and four intermediate ones. Inspectors also found that food contact surfaces had not been properly cleaned or sanitized, that food was not being cooked to required minimum temperatures, and that the restaurant posted no consumer advisory warning customers about raw or undercooked items on the menu.
That last point matters at a ceviche bar, where raw and lightly cured fish is the centerpiece of the menu.
What Inspectors Found
The parasite destruction citation is among the most direct violations a ceviche restaurant can receive. Florida requires that fish served raw or undercooked be frozen to specific temperatures before service, a step designed to kill parasites including Anisakis and tapeworm larvae that survive in raw marine fish. Inspectors found that step was not being followed.
Alongside that finding, inspectors cited food coming from unapproved or unknown sources. A restaurant that cannot document where its fish came from cannot trace it if a customer becomes ill.
The intermediate violations compounded the picture. Sewage or wastewater was not being disposed of properly. Multi-use utensils had not been properly cleaned. Wiping cloths were being used improperly, a violation inspectors frequently connect to cross-contamination between surfaces. Ventilation and lighting were also cited as inadequate.
What These Violations Mean
The parasite destruction failure is not a paperwork problem. When fish served raw, cured in citrus, or only lightly cooked has not been frozen to the temperatures required to kill parasites, diners can ingest live Anisakis larvae, which burrow into the stomach lining and cause severe abdominal pain, nausea, and in some cases require surgical removal. At a restaurant where ceviche is the signature dish, this violation touches nearly every plate leaving the kitchen.
The unapproved food source violation means inspectors could not verify that the fish served at Pisco y Nazca on April 13 had passed through any USDA or FDA-regulated supply chain. If a customer became sick that day, there would be no traceable origin for the product.
The absence of a consumer advisory is a separate but related failure. Customers who are pregnant, elderly, immunocompromised, or very young face significantly elevated risk from raw fish, and Florida requires that menus or table notices warn them. Without that disclosure, those customers had no way to make an informed choice.
The food contact surface and utensil cleaning violations create a secondary contamination pathway. Bacteria and biofilm that build up on cutting boards, prep surfaces, and utensils that are not properly sanitized transfer directly to food. Combined with the sewage disposal violation, the inspection record from April 13 describes a kitchen where multiple independent contamination routes existed simultaneously.
The Longer Record
The April 13 inspection was not an outlier. State records show Pisco y Nazca has been inspected 23 times and has accumulated 279 total violations across that history, with zero emergency closures.
The eight most recent inspections before April 13 each produced high-severity violations. In March 2025, inspectors cited nine high-severity violations in a single visit. In October 2023, the count was six high-severity violations and three intermediate ones. In March 2023, seven high-severity violations. In November 2022, six high-severity violations.
The pattern does not show a restaurant that had a bad month in April 2026.
High-severity violations have appeared at this location in every inspection on record in this dataset, including the follow-up inspection on April 21, eight days after the April 13 visit, which produced four more high-severity violations and two intermediate ones.
The inspection history at Pisco y Nazca covers roughly three and a half years of documented visits. In that span, the number of high-severity violations per inspection has ranged from four to nine. It has never reached zero.
The Restaurant Remained Open
Florida's emergency closure authority is triggered when inspectors determine that conditions pose an immediate threat to public health. On April 13, 2026, with six high-severity violations documented at Pisco y Nazca, including failures in parasite destruction, food sourcing, cooking temperatures, and surface sanitation, inspectors did not make that determination.
The restaurant served customers that day, and every day after.