Health Code Violations on a Curve
Mar 18, 2008 St. Louis, missouri, restaurants
One of the most interesting things about trying to find information about a new restaurant or a small ethnic spot is that the City of St. Louis now has all their health inspections online. Often Google turns up the City’s site for these types of places on the first hit and at the very least they almost always make the first page.
Needless to say it’s interesting to plug in the places you like and see how they fare.
You can even play a sort of Health Code Violation game where you pull up restaurants you assume will not have done well. Sometimes it’s a surprise and you find that they actually scored quite well, but other times they scored far lower than you’d ever imagined leaving you a bit uncomfortable when you see what it takes to post a “B” sticker in your window.
Rather then sticking to the standards we’ve come to except from years of schooling:
- A = 90-100
- B = 80-89
- C = 70-79
Health Codes apparently work off a curve:
- A = 85-100.
- B = 70 to 84 OR a critical violation.
- C = less than 70 OR a critical violation.
What this means to you is that sure, your Neighborhood Grill & Bar, Applebee’s at 4550 Forest Park, can pat themselves on the back for a job well done; they earned an “A.” But, they’re rocking a curved 87.5.
And I was shocked to see that a St. Louis favorite has only an 87.4 which they just reclaimed after having been downgraded to a “B” in January.* A decent handful of spots mentioned on the stlbites.com forum are also scraping by with low “A’s” as well. One is even a sushi restaurant that got a sub 90 “A,” and of all the places I’d be willing to go with shoddy health scores, a restaurant where I’m expected to consume raw seafood is definitely not one of them.
One thing I find especially interesting is the disparity of lower scores overall. Whether that means people are cleaner than I’d anticipated, or whether that means it’s easier to give an “A” than it is to fill out downgrade paperwork, I do not know.
What I do know having witnessed a few inspections is that inspectors were often eager to say things like:”Are you sure you want to keep that bottle of sanitizing solution that close to the grill?” To which you promptly replied: “no sir” before whisking it away as if it had never been there.
Therefore I’m not really sure how anyone could lose an “A” without being ridiculously unsanitary.
You can learn about the ratings here and you can see how your favorites fare here. Also, for those of you in St. Louis County you can see your health inspection info here, though it does not work as well.
* I’m not saying what it is. You’ll just have to find it on your own.
Tags: health code, health inspections
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March 19th, 2008 at 1:49 am
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March 19th, 2008 at 9:28 am
I used to be an inspector for an insurance company. I was shocked at what I would see in the kitchen at some places. My friends now think I’m just being paranoid, but I love to eat at places where I can see into the kitchen. God Bless “In Sight It Must Be Right”!