The owner of The Crazy Chef restaurant was fined £2,000 yesterday after admitting a number of breaches of the food hygiene regulations, including failure to ensure staff handled food properly.
A chef in the restaurant in Tallaght retail centre, Dublin, was observed handling a baguette directly after placing a piece of raw steak on a grill. A member of staff was also observed walking through the kitchen with a cigarette in his mouth.
The proprietor, Sean O'Loughlin, was fined £2,000 on 10 counts of breaching hygiene regulations during a visit by an environmental health officer on June 23rd last year.
Dublin District Court was told the inspector found the ceiling in the food preparation area stained black throughout, floors were filthy and walls were stained and greasy.
Ventilation was inadequate with the result that a back door without a flyscreen was left open. Cleaning tools such as mops and towels were dirty and there were no facilities for cleaning them.
Food such as diced chicken and mayonnaise, which should have been kept at five degrees celsius, was found at temperatures of between 20 and 25 degrees.
Food workers were not adequately supervised, with the result that the inspector observed the chef placing a raw steak in a grill, pick up a baguette without washing his hands and also use his hands to press pieces of chicken into another baguette. The chef also carried a stainless steel spoon in his back pocket.
O'Loughlin told the court this was a once-off incident and all the problems had been rectified by closing the premises for two-and-a-half days after the inspection.
He had believed the ventilation system was adequate as it was installed only two years earlier when the premises opened as part of a new building. All the equipment had been inspected and approved by the health board.
Judge Tim Crowley noted the conditions found by the health inspector appeared to have built up over a number of months.
He imposed fines of £200 on each of the 10 breaches and also ordered O'Loughlin to pay £650 health board costs.