MIAMI, FL. A state inspector walked into Sunny Side Cafe and Eatery at 7244 Biscayne Blvd on September 28 and documented seven high-severity violations, including food not cooked to required minimum temperatures and parasite destruction procedures that were not being followed. The restaurant was not closed.
What Inspectors Found
The undercooking citation is among the most direct paths to a sick customer. The inspector found food not reaching required minimum internal temperatures, the precise condition under which Salmonella in poultry survives and reaches a plate.
Parasite destruction procedures were also not being followed. That violation applies to fish, pork, and wild game served raw or undercooked, and it means the freezing or cooking steps designed to kill parasites like Anisakis or Trichinella were skipped or done incorrectly.
Toxic chemicals were improperly stored or labeled near food. That is not a paperwork violation. Mislabeled or misplaced chemicals can contaminate food directly, and the exposure can be acute.
The inspector also cited the cafe for failing to maintain proper shell stock identification records for shellfish. Oysters, clams, and mussels are often eaten raw or barely cooked. Without traceability tags, there is no way to identify the harvest source if a customer gets sick.
Rounding out the seven high-severity findings: food contact surfaces not properly cleaned, time-as-a-public-health-control procedures not followed, and improper handwashing technique. Four intermediate violations accompanied those, covering multi-use utensils, wiping cloth handling, ventilation, and toilet facilities.
What These Violations Mean
The undercooking violation and the parasite destruction failure are not separate problems. They are two versions of the same failure: food leaving the kitchen without the heat treatment required to neutralize biological threats. Salmonella survives below 165 degrees Fahrenheit in poultry. Anisakis larvae survive in fish that is not properly frozen or fully cooked. A customer eating either item would have no way to know.
The shellfish traceability failure compounds the risk. When someone gets sick from a raw oyster or clam, investigators trace the illness back through harvest tags to identify the source and pull product from other restaurants. Without those records at Sunny Side Cafe, that chain breaks entirely.
Improperly cleaned food contact surfaces and improperly used wiping cloths work together to spread contamination across a kitchen. Cutting boards and prep surfaces that are not properly sanitized transfer bacteria from one food item to the next. Wiping cloths used across multiple surfaces without proper sanitizing do the same thing. Both violations were cited here, on the same inspection.
The improper handwashing technique citation deserves its own attention. An employee who attempts to wash their hands but uses the wrong technique still transfers pathogens to every surface and food item they touch afterward. Combined with inadequate toilet facilities, which discourage proper restroom use by staff, the hygiene infrastructure at the cafe on September 28 was failing at multiple points simultaneously.
The Longer Record
The September 28 inspection was not an anomaly. State records show 19 inspections on file for Sunny Side Cafe, with 175 total violations accumulated across that history.
The pattern in recent years is consistent. The February 2026 inspection produced 10 high-severity and 6 intermediate violations, the highest single-visit count in the recent record. The July 2025 inspection found 7 high and 3 intermediate. The January 2025 inspection found 7 high and 3 intermediate. The September 2024 inspection found 5 high violations. The January 2024 inspection found 8 high and 3 intermediate violations.
That is five inspections in under three years, each producing between 5 and 10 high-severity violations.
The one exception in that stretch was April 2024, when the cafe drew zero high-severity violations and one intermediate. That inspection stands alone in the recent record.
The cafe was emergency-closed once before, in July 2021, after an inspector documented fly activity. It reopened the following day. The July 2022 inspection that immediately followed that period found 8 high-severity violations.
Still Open
The September 28 inspection resulted in no emergency closure order. Seven high-severity violations, including undercooking, parasite risk, and toxic chemical storage near food, were documented and the cafe continued operating.
State records show this is the fourth inspection since January 2024 to produce seven or more high-severity violations at this address.
The restaurant on Biscayne Boulevard remained open after the inspector left.
