JACKSONVILLE, FL. Food at Tepeyolot Cerveceria on Kings Avenue was not cooked to the required minimum temperature when a state inspector visited on May 27, a high-severity violation that means pathogens like Salmonella can survive in the food and reach a customer's plate.
That was one of seven high-severity violations documented that day. The restaurant remained open.
What Inspectors Found
The inspector also cited the restaurant for inadequate shell stock identification and records. Tepeyolot Cerveceria serves shellfish, which are consumed raw or lightly cooked, and without proper sourcing tags and harvest records, there is no way to trace an outbreak back to a specific lot if customers become sick.
Food contact surfaces were not properly cleaned or sanitized, a violation that turns cutting boards, prep tables, and countertops into transfer points for bacteria moving from raw ingredients to ready-to-eat food. The restaurant was also cited for posting no consumer advisory for raw or undercooked items, meaning customers who are elderly, pregnant, or immunocompromised had no way to know they were ordering something that carries elevated risk.
Staff demonstrated no allergen awareness. Food allergies affect 32 million Americans and are linked to roughly 30,000 emergency room visits each year. A server or cook who cannot identify allergens in a dish is a direct link in that chain.
The person in charge was not present or not performing duties when the inspector arrived. Employees were observed using improper hand and arm washing technique, which means pathogens remain on hands even when a worker goes through the motions of washing. Three intermediate violations accompanied the high-severity findings: improper sewage or wastewater disposal, multi-use utensils not properly cleaned, and single-use items being reused.
What These Violations Mean
Undercooking is not a minor procedural lapse. Salmonella in poultry survives below 165 degrees Fahrenheit and cannot be detected by sight or smell. A customer who eats undercooked food has no way of knowing the risk they are taking, and the consequences, including hospitalization, can be severe.
The shellfish traceability failure compounds that risk. Oysters, clams, and mussels are filter feeders that concentrate bacteria and viruses from the water they inhabit. The tagging and harvest record system exists specifically so that when people get sick, public health officials can identify the source lot and pull it from other restaurants. Without those records at Tepeyolot, that chain breaks entirely.
The absence of a person in charge performing duties is not a paperwork violation. CDC data shows that establishments without active managerial control have three times as many critical violations as those with engaged supervision. Every other failure documented on May 27, the handwashing technique, the unsanitized surfaces, the reused single-use items, is exactly the kind of cascading problem that active management is supposed to prevent.
Improper sewage disposal creates the risk of fecal contamination spreading through the facility. Combined with improperly cleaned utensils, which can develop bacterial biofilms within 24 hours that resist standard cleaning, the intermediate violations documented here are not background noise. They are part of the same picture.
The Longer Record
The May 27 inspection was the thirteenth on record for Tepeyolot Cerveceria. Across those 13 inspections, the facility has accumulated 97 total violations. The restaurant has never been emergency-closed.
The pattern in the prior inspection history is consistent. In May 2025, inspectors cited 8 high-severity and 2 intermediate violations. In October 2025, the count was 6 high-severity and 2 intermediate. The April 2026 inspection, just five weeks before the May visit, turned up 3 high-severity and 1 intermediate violation. High-severity violations have appeared in every inspection on record going back to August 2022.
The most recent inspection is not an outlier. It is the highest single-visit high-severity count in the facility's recorded history, but it arrives in a context where no inspection has come back clean.
Still Open
State inspectors documented 7 high-severity violations at Tepeyolot Cerveceria on May 27, 2026, including food not cooked to minimum temperature, no allergen awareness, shellfish with no traceable sourcing records, and no consumer advisory for raw items.
The restaurant was not closed.