OPA-LOCKA, FL. Food at Restaurante Universal Maria's on Opa-Locka Boulevard was not cooked to the minimum required temperature when a state inspector walked through the door on September 17, a violation that means pathogens like Salmonella can survive in poultry and reach a customer's plate. That was one of ten high-severity violations documented that day. The restaurant was not closed.
The inspection, conducted at the 2072 Opa-Locka Blvd. location in Miami-Dade County, produced a violation list that covered nearly every layer of food safety practice: management, employee health, sanitation, sourcing, storage, and cooking. Two intermediate violations were added on top of the ten high-severity citations.
What Inspectors Found
The undercooked food violation and the improper use of time as a public health control appeared together in the same inspection. When a restaurant uses time, rather than temperature, to control food safety, it is required to track exactly how long food has been in the temperature danger zone. The inspector found that system was not being properly followed, meaning food could have been sitting in conditions favorable to bacterial growth for an unknown period.
Toxic substances were improperly identified, stored, or used. That violation means chemicals capable of contaminating food were not handled in a way that kept them separated from the food preparation environment.
The restaurant also lacked a consumer advisory for raw or undercooked foods, a required notice that informs customers, particularly those who are elderly, pregnant, or immunocompromised, that certain menu items carry additional risk.
Inspectors also cited inadequate shell stock identification records. Shellfish, including oysters, clams, and mussels, require tags that trace them back to their harvest source. Without those records, there is no way to identify where the shellfish came from if a customer becomes ill.
What These Violations Mean
The combination of no employee health policy and employees not reporting illness symptoms is one of the more direct routes to a multi-victim outbreak. Norovirus, which causes approximately 20 million cases of illness in the United States each year, spreads readily when sick food workers handle food without a policy requiring them to stay home or report symptoms to a manager. Both violations were cited at this restaurant on the same day.
The person in charge was either absent or not performing duties during the inspection. That matters beyond the single citation because managerial oversight is what prevents other violations from occurring in the first place. Facilities without active managerial control accumulate critical violations at roughly three times the rate of those with it, according to CDC data. At Restaurante Universal Maria's, inspectors found ten high-severity violations on a day when no one appeared to be running the safety side of the operation.
Food contact surfaces that are not properly cleaned and sanitized become vehicles for bacterial transfer between every item that touches them. Multi-use utensils with the same problem develop bacterial biofilms within 24 hours, films that resist ordinary cleaning and continue contaminating food. Both were cited here.
Improper handwashing technique means that even when an employee attempts to wash their hands, pathogens remain. The violation is distinct from simply skipping handwashing, and in some ways more insidious, because it creates a false sense of compliance while the contamination pathway stays open.
The Longer Record
The September 17 inspection was not an anomaly. State records show 25 inspections on file for this location, with 172 total violations accumulated across that history.
High-severity violations have appeared in six of the eight most recent inspections on record. The April 2024 inspection produced four high-severity citations. March 2026 produced three high-severity and three intermediate violations. The pattern is not one of a restaurant that occasionally slips and quickly corrects, but of a location that returns to serious violations on a regular cycle.
The restaurant has never been emergency-closed. That record remained intact after September 17, despite the ten high-severity violations documented that day.
A follow-up inspection the very next day, September 18, found one remaining high-severity violation. The speed of that partial correction is notable, but so is what preceded it: a single day in which food was undercooked, toxic substances were improperly stored, no illness policy existed, no consumer advisory was posted, shellfish records were inadequate, food contact surfaces were unsanitized, and no one in charge was actively managing any of it.
The Longer Record
Restaurante Universal Maria's: Recent Inspection History
As of the September 18 follow-up, Restaurante Universal Maria's was still operating on Opa-Locka Boulevard. The one high-severity violation that remained after a night of corrections was not specified in the available records.
