WILTON MANORS, FL. State inspectors visiting Tee Jay Thai Sushi on Wilton Drive on August 20 found that the restaurant was serving fish without any documentation that it had been frozen to kill parasites, a required step for any raw or undercooked fish on a sushi menu.
That was one of nine high-severity violations documented that day. The restaurant was not closed.
What Inspectors Found
The August 20 inspection produced a list that reads less like a routine citation sheet and more like a catalog of compounding failures. Beyond the parasite documentation problem, inspectors found food sourced from unapproved or unknown suppliers, meaning there was no way to trace where the ingredients came from or whether they had passed any federal safety inspection.
Inspectors also cited the restaurant for food not cooked to required minimum temperatures, inadequate handwashing by employees, and handwashing facilities that did not meet state standards. Toxic chemicals were found improperly stored or labeled near food areas. Shell stock records, required for oysters, clams, and mussels to allow traceability in the event of illness, were inadequate. Food contact surfaces were not properly cleaned or sanitized.
No person in charge was present or performing supervisory duties during the inspection.
The one intermediate violation involved improper sewage or wastewater disposal.
What These Violations Mean
For a restaurant serving sushi and raw shellfish, the parasite destruction and food sourcing violations carry the most direct risk to anyone who ate there. Florida requires that fish served raw or undercooked be frozen to specific temperatures for specific periods of time to kill parasites including Anisakis, a roundworm found in marine fish that can cause severe abdominal pain and, in some cases, requires surgical removal. Without documentation that this process occurred, there is no way to confirm the fish on any plate met that standard.
The unapproved food source violation compounds that risk. When food arrives from suppliers outside the regulated supply chain, it bypasses USDA and FDA inspection entirely. If someone became ill after eating there, investigators would have no supplier records to trace.
The handwashing violations, both the behavior of employees and the adequacy of the facilities themselves, represent a direct contamination pathway. Hands that move between raw proteins, surfaces, and ready-to-eat food without proper washing are one of the most documented routes for spreading pathogens including Salmonella and E. coli. The fact that the handwashing infrastructure itself was cited means the problem was not just behavioral.
Improperly stored or labeled chemicals near food create a separate and acute risk: accidental contamination of food or food surfaces with cleaning agents or pesticides, which can cause poisoning with no warning sign visible to the customer.
The Longer Record
Tee Jay Thai Sushi: Inspection Pattern, 2025-2026
The August inspection was not an isolated bad day. State records show 33 inspections on file for this location, with 257 total violations accumulated across that history.
In June of this year, the restaurant was emergency-closed after inspectors found evidence of rodent activity. That closure lasted one day. The restaurant passed a reinspection on June 18 and reopened, then drew another high-severity violation at a follow-up visit four days later on June 22.
The October 2025 inspection produced five high-severity violations. The July 2025 visits each generated high-severity citations. The pattern across the past year is not one of occasional lapses followed by sustained correction. It is a facility that has cycled through serious violations, brief remediation, and renewed citations across multiple inspection periods.
The August 20 inspection was the worst single-day result in the recent record, nine high-severity violations at once, including failures that touch nearly every major category of food safety risk: sourcing, preparation, temperature, hygiene, chemical storage, and management oversight.
Tee Jay Thai Sushi was not emergency-closed after the August 20 inspection. It remained open.
