PANAMA CITY, FL. Food was not cooked to the required minimum temperature at Tokyo on East 23rd Street, according to a May 6, 2026 state inspection that documented six high-severity violations and left the restaurant open to serve customers.
The undercooking citation was one of six high-priority findings inspectors recorded in a single visit. The others: no employee health policy, inadequate handwashing facilities, improper handwashing technique, food contact surfaces not properly cleaned or sanitized, and no consumer advisory for raw or undercooked foods. Two intermediate violations, covering improperly cleaned multi-use utensils and improper sanitizing procedures, rounded out the report.
What Inspectors Found
The handwashing violations are notable because they appear in combination. Inspectors cited the restaurant for having inadequate handwashing facilities and for employees using improper technique, meaning even the handwashing that did occur was not effective. That pairing creates a gap in the most basic line of defense against contamination.
The food contact surface citation compounds that gap. When cutting boards, prep surfaces, and utensils are not properly cleaned and sanitized, bacteria transferred by hands move directly onto food.
What These Violations Mean
The undercooking violation carries the most direct risk for anyone who ate at Tokyo on or around May 6. Salmonella in poultry survives below 165 degrees Fahrenheit. At a restaurant that also lacks a functioning employee health policy, a sick worker handling undercooked food creates two simultaneous transmission routes at once.
The absence of an employee health policy means there is no written requirement for workers to report symptoms like vomiting, diarrhea, or jaundice before handling food. Norovirus, one of the most common causes of foodborne illness outbreaks in restaurant settings, spreads through exactly that scenario. The policy violation at Tokyo is not a paperwork technicality. It is the absence of a system that is supposed to stop a sick employee from working the line.
The missing consumer advisory is a separate but significant concern for a restaurant that likely serves raw or undercooked fish. Without that notice on the menu, customers with compromised immune systems, pregnant women, the elderly, and young children have no way to know a dish carries elevated risk. They cannot make an informed choice about what to order.
The intermediate violation for improper sanitizer concentration ties the rest together. A sanitizing solution that is too weak leaves pathogens alive on surfaces even after a cleaning attempt. Combined with improperly cleaned utensils and inadequate handwashing infrastructure, the May 6 inspection describes a kitchen where multiple standard safeguards were not functioning at the same time.
The Longer Record
The May 2026 inspection was not an outlier. State records show Tokyo has been inspected 33 times and has accumulated 224 violations across its history. The restaurant has logged high-severity violations in seven of the eight most recent inspections on record.
The January 2026 inspection, just four months before this one, produced 8 high-severity and 3 intermediate violations, the worst single-visit tally in the recent record. The October 2024 inspection found 6 high-severity violations with no intermediates. The January 2024 inspection found 7 high-severity violations. The only clean inspection in recent years was March 2024, which showed zero violations in either category.
Tokyo was emergency-closed once, in January 2022, after inspectors found roach activity. The restaurant reopened the following day. That closure is the only time in the facility's documented history that the state moved to shut it down.
Open for Business
The pattern that emerges from the full inspection record is not one of isolated incidents. High-severity violation counts of 6, 7, 8, and 4 appear in consecutive inspection cycles, with one clean visit in between. The violations documented in May 2026, including undercooking, no health policy, and compromised handwashing, are the same categories that have appeared repeatedly across prior inspections.
State inspectors cited Tokyo for six high-severity violations on May 6, 2026. The restaurant was not closed.
