MIAMI, FL. A state inspector visiting Shahs of Kabob at 48 SW 12th Street in September found food sourced from unapproved or unknown suppliers being served to customers, a violation that means there is no way to trace that food back through the supply chain if someone gets sick.
That was one of nine high-severity violations documented during the September 18 inspection. The restaurant was not closed.
What Inspectors Found
The September 18 inspection produced a violation list that cut across nearly every major food safety category at once. Inspectors cited inadequate handwashing by food employees and separately cited improper handwashing technique, meaning workers were both skipping handwashing steps and performing them incorrectly when they did wash.
Food contact surfaces were not properly cleaned or sanitized. Inspectors also found no consumer advisory posted for raw or undercooked menu items, which is required so that customers who are elderly, pregnant, or immunocompromised can make informed decisions about what they order.
Two separate violations involved toxic chemicals: one for improper storage or labeling, one for improper identification, storage, or use. Both were flagged at high severity.
The intermediate violation involved improper sewage or wastewater disposal.
What These Violations Mean
The unapproved food source violation is among the most consequential on the list. When food arrives outside the regulated supply chain, it has not passed USDA or FDA inspection. If a customer becomes ill, investigators have no records to trace the food back to its origin, making outbreak investigations significantly harder and slower.
The undercooking violation compounds that risk directly. Poultry that does not reach 165 degrees Fahrenheit can carry live Salmonella. At a kabob restaurant where grilled meats are a core menu item, a temperature failure is not a paperwork problem.
The two handwashing violations together describe a facility where the most basic contamination barrier was failing at two levels simultaneously. Employees were not washing when they should have been, and when they did wash, the technique was insufficient to remove pathogens. Studies consistently show that proper handwashing is the single most effective intervention against foodborne illness transmission in a commercial kitchen.
The shellfish traceability violation means that oysters, clams, or mussels served at the restaurant could not be traced to a certified harvest location or harvest date. Shellfish filter large volumes of water and concentrate bacteria and viruses, including Vibrio and norovirus. Without harvest tags and records, there is no way to determine whether shellfish came from a closed or contaminated water body.
The toxic chemical violations are in a separate category from the food handling failures but are no less serious. Chemicals stored near food or improperly labeled can cause acute poisoning if they contaminate a food surface or are mistaken for a food-safe substance.
The Longer Record
The September 2026 inspection is not an outlier. State records show 26 inspections on file for Shahs of Kabob, with 317 total violations documented across that history.
Every inspection in the available prior record produced high-severity violations. The October 2025 callback inspection, conducted on consecutive days, found 8 high-severity violations on October 8 and 4 high-severity violations on October 9. The February 2025 inspection found 8 high-severity violations. September 2024 found 7. February 2024 found 7.
The worst single inspection in the prior record was September 2023, when inspectors documented 12 high-severity violations and 2 intermediate violations in one visit. The January 2023 inspection found 10 high-severity violations.
The pattern across eight documented prior inspections shows a floor of 4 high-severity violations and a ceiling of 12, with no inspection producing zero high-severity findings. The facility has never been emergency-closed.
The Longer Record in Numbers
Shahs of Kabob: High-Severity Violations by Inspection
Across those eight prior inspections, the restaurant accumulated at least 64 high-severity violations before the September 2026 visit added nine more. The total violation count across all 26 inspections on record stands at 317.
After the September 18 inspection, Shahs of Kabob remained open for business.
