NYC Dept of Health
Inspectors from the city Health Department walked into an Upper West Side eatery on July 20. By the time they walked out, the place was no longer allowed to serve anyone.
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Halal Cajun Platters, at 2707 Broadway (between 103rd and 104th streets), was ordered closed following the July 20 inspection, which racked up 74 violation points across nine separate sanitary violations. Five of those violations were flagged in red on the inspection report, the designation the department reserves for its most serious findings.Among them: live roaches in the facility’s food or non food areas. Cold food that requires temperature control was being held above 41 degrees, and cooked food was not being cooled through the required temperature steps, meaning from 140 degrees down to 70 degrees within two hours and then down to 41 degrees within four more. Inspectors also found problems with hand washing facilities, which the code requires to be accessible, unobstructed and stocked with soap, a drying device and hot and cold running water at adequate pressure. The fifth red flag was administrative: no manager or supervisor of food operations held a Food Protection Certificate.
The remaining four violations covered conditions conducive to pests, drainage and back flow prevention problems including improperly disposed condensation or liquid waste, unclean or improperly sealed non food contact surfaces, and issues with single service articles such as straws and disposable containers.
That 74 is worth putting in perspective. Under the letter grading system the city has used since 2010, a score of 0 to 13 points earns an A, 14 to 27 points is a B, and 28 or more means a C. Points accumulate based on severity, and inspectors assign a minimum of seven points for a public health hazard, five for a critical violation and two for a general violation, with the authority to go higher depending on what they find. A restaurant scoring 14 or more on its initial inspection does not get a letter immediately. It posts a “Grade Pending” card and gets a second look. Halal Cajun Platters’ total is more than two and a half times the threshold for the city’s lowest grade, though it is not the worst the neighborhood has seen this month. The Health Department shut down the Tal Bagels at 2446 Broadway three days earlier, and that inspection report came to 157 violation points. The company that operates four Tal Bagels shops on the East Side said afterward that it sold the Broadway store more than 20 years ago and has no connection to the location the city closed.
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Points alone are not what closes a restaurant, though. When an inspector finds one or more violations representing an imminent public health hazard that cannot be corrected before the inspection ends, the department can order the establishment to temporarily close. To reopen, the operator has to correct the violations and notify the Health Department in writing, and the department then conducts a reopening inspection, and may conduct as many inspections as it considers necessary before allowing the business to operate again. Owners can also challenge violations and closure orders at the city’s administrative tribunal.The closure comes barely a year into the restaurant’s run. Halal Cajun Platters opened just last year, taking over the space that had previously been home to Yakitori Sun-Chan. It’s been one of the neighborhood’s later options, listing hours of 7:30 a.m. to 2:30 a.m. The restaurant’s website is a bare bones page with no dishes or prices, describing the menu only in categories: shrimp, crab, fish and combination platters. It carries a 4.5 star rating from 45 Google reviews.
The full inspection report is available through the Health Department.
ILTUWS called the restaurant and nobody answered. A message sent through Instagram had not been returned as of publishing time. We’ll provide updates if the restaurant responds or if the closure is lifted.
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