Chipotle in Seattle closed for repeated violations

[HuckleB]

Source: Seattle Times

Seattle health officials closed a South Lake Union Chipotle restaurant Thursday for repeated food-safety violations.

The move to shutter the Mexican-style restaurant, at 212 Westlake Ave., comes more than a month after the fast-food chain closed 43 sites in Washington and Oregon amid an E. coli outbreak that eventually sickened 52 people in nine states and sent 20 people to hospitals.


It also comes in a week when more than 120 students at Boston College were sickened by norovirus after eating at a single Chipotle restaurant, health officials reported.

In the most recent Seattle case, the restaurant received red violations on three consecutive visits from health inspectors, according to a blog by officials at Public Health — Seattle & King County.

Read more: http://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/health/seattle-chipotle-closed-for-repeated-violations/

---

Every month, since at least August, this company has faced new concerns about the health of its food. WTF?

[rpannier]

1. If I can find it, I'll post it for you

There was a story a while back about the abuse of farm workers in Mexico. They weren't allowed to use the bathroom so they went in the fields.
I think the story said they were a supplier for Chipotle
Don't quote me, but I'll see if I can find it

[HuckleB]

2. That would not be good, either, though I'm sure the place supplies many companies.

Still, Chipotle made a good move back in June in regard to restaurant employees, but put it off for a year, and one has to wonder how things would have turned out, if the delay hadn't occurred.

"But holding off a year on sick pay makes no sense for a food chain. The last thing you want is to put front line employees who handle food in the position of working sick or not making rent. It’s not Chipotle’s fault that the US is one of the only countries that doesn’t mandate paid sick days, but as long as they are at it, they may as well do everything they can to address the issue."

From: http://fafdl.org/blog/2015/06/10/chipotle-does-right-by-hourly-employees-so-many-questions/

[Yallow]

3. That Darn Big Guvvmint

Keeping people safe from contaminated food.

What kind of country is this?

Spit.

[HuckleB]

4. Indeed.

[murielm99]

5. Part of their problem may be that they prepare

much of their food off-site and ship it to their restaurants pre-prepped.

If they cut tomatoes, an lettuce on-site, shredded cheese there, and did other prep, they could keep better track of who is practicing proper hygiene. They could be sure containers and utensils were clean.

I think too many places like this is shipping their ingredients pre-prepped.

I don't doubt that there are abused farm workers. But I heard stories about abused farm workers forty years ago, too. Some of the same things are happening today.

They need outside health inspectors to evaluate their operation from top to bottom.

[Tab]

7. Do you know how their supply chain works?

I'm an hour away from one of the outbreaks, and I suspect we're supplied by the same place, since I'm on the outer limit of where they seem to be located.

[murielm99]

12. I don't have real knowledge of it.

I saw something on a news program, but they did not go into a lot of detail. They were speaking about the food items that were prepped and then shipped to each restaurant. The news person spoke about how the company was considering looking at that, and at the sterilization procedures within each restaurant. That is where I got the idea that a lot of the food was pre-prepped. Other than that, I don't know.

I do know that MacDonald's was one of the first places to do any pre-prepping of food. We don't think anything of that these days. We all buy a lot of that type of food in the grocery store. It was what my daughter learned was called "value added" food, because it took the prep time out of the equation for the consumer. (She majored in Spanish, but added a major in institutional management when she was considering opening a restaurant).

Maybe this isn't a problem yet for anyone other than Chipotle. But we seem to have too many of these outbreaks.

[Tab]

14. Pretty much everything from everyone else (not higher-end) is pre-prepped, that I know

But I wasn't sure about Chipotle, which seems to follow a different model. That said, I really doubted Chipotle would make individual franchises negotiate supplies, so I assume there's a central distribution and my local place was supplied out of the same place.

[Mosby]

17. I think the opposite is true

Off site prep can be done in a better controlled environment by people with specific training and dedicated supervision. The biggest issue imo is temp control.

Note that the norovirus outbreak at that Boston chipotle was caused by one sick employee who prepped the chicken that particular day.

[murielm99]

19. Okay.

It has been years since I worked in that type of environment. You may be right. I think it is interesting to hear what others have to say about this.

Years ago, I did work as a restaurant cook. I worked at a county health department, too. I got to know some of the sanitation guys, but that was not my department.

I like Chipotle's, and hate to see this happening to them.

[ErikJ]

6. I think they were too successful

Every time I went there, there was a long line and the workers looked frantic and very stressed out trying to keep up. Then they use a lot of fresh veggies prepared at a rapid pace and bad things are bound to happen.

They have / had more customers than their prep line system can handle, then the kitchen gets sloppy and customers get sick.

[HuckleB]

11. That could be part of the problem, indeed.

The desire to put the product together in front of the customers may not help, either.

[goldent]

8. I think I'm done with Chipotle for a while.

They've had weeks to fix it, and haven't been able to.

[HuckleB]

18. It's been going on since August.

http://www.marketplace.org/2015/12/10/business/chipotle-tries-recover-outbreaks

[TheBlackAdder]

9. I've noticed something about their handling of their pulled pork that is concerning.

.


People that were several in front of me did not eat pork, and asked which items had pork in them.

One ordered a chicken burrito and the other a steak bowl.


The guy in front of me ordered a pork burrito, and when they lifted the pork up, they carried it over the steak, dripping pork juice onto the cut beef. I ordered a steak burrito, as I don't have that limitation, but thought how culturally tone deaf that was. I spoke to the people behind the counter, at several different locations over the past months, and none of them relocated the pork to prevent crossover contamination.


.

[Sunlei]

10. The prep locations must be filthy has anyone checked the source of ingredients?

[disndat]

13. Why is it happening only in Chipotle?

All the fast food restaurants serve pre-prepared foods. Why just Chipotle? I heard that the workers re unhappy the Chipotle's
refusing to join the $15/hr. demand of advocates.
I am very pro-unions, as a member myself and an advocate of $15/hr pay, but it seems strange to me that only Chipotle
is affected by unsanitary pre-prepared foods.

[HuckleB]

15. Lots of possibilities.

Did the company grow too fast? Are the lines too long, and workers skimp on safety to get people the food faster? Is it an issue to have the workers make the food in front of people, especially with such long lines? Are there company practices that need to be improved? Did the push to go anti-GMO lead to supplier changes without enough verification of safety?

[romanic]

16. I think Chipotle has its own food supplier.

And farms right?

[hedgehog]

20. After watching a woman tear through a dozen heads of leaf lettuce

looking for just the right one, I feel better about buying pre-packaged salads.

[HuckleB]

21. Was Chipotle too busy avoiding the fake dangers of GMOs to focus on actual food safety?

ttp://www.vox.com/business-and-finance/2015/12/12/9910642/chipotle-gmo-e-coli?utm_campaign=vox&utm_content=article%3Atop&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter