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State shuts down restaurant after customer finds creepy surprise in meal

A customer called in a complaint to the Florida Division of Hotels and Restaurant alleging after ordering lunch she found "a cockroach in the food."
Sab Café in St. Petersburg was closed down last week after code violations were found.

ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. — In the heart of downtown St. Pete across from Sundial, Sab Café serves up Thai fusion -- a favorite for customer Charles Saletta who stopped by for the first time this week to order takeout.

“I pretty much love the egg rolls, and the spring [rolls] and some of the pork meals,” said Saletta on his was out from picking up his meal.

But he and other customers weren’t too happy when we spilled the beans on Sab Café’s health code violations from just last week.

A customer called in a complaint to the Florida Division of Hotels and Restaurant alleging after ordering lunch she found “a cockroach in the food.” A state health inspector showed up just days later, documenting 23 violations, including both dead and live roaches all over the kitchen.

And as if that wasn’t enough, the inspector also documented temperature violations on the raw pork found at 61 degrees and raw beef stored over the cooked broth, a potential cross-contamination issue.

“They’re allowed to be open, so hopefully they corrected it,” said Saletta, who was hopeful the health inspector did a thorough re-inspection before allowing the establishment to reopen.

On Wednesday, 10Investigates stopped in to follow up on the state’s inspection to check on conditions a week later.

Owner Damron Rattanachane told us he didn’t want to be interviewed on camera but did agree to show us around the kitchen.

“This is where the inspector found the problem,” said Rattanachane, pointing to a recently caulked gap in the wall where he says the inspector found the roaches hiding.

He says his employees have also started unloading food deliveries outside because the cardboard boxes often are delivered containing roaches.

We found dead roaches at Sab Café, but no live ones.

On our inspection Wednesday we still found numerous dead insects all along the walls and baseboards, but after searching high and low, there were no more live roaches that we could find. Dead roaches would be considered a basic violation by the state, whereas live roaches are a high-priority violation that can result in the restaurant’s closure.

The absence of live roaches was good news for many, but some customers were still uneasy.

"Obviously, I’m going to look at my food very closely,” said Saletta. “It’s not something you want to hear about after you buy your food and want to eat it.”

Sab Café was cleared by the state to reopen last Friday.

Rattanachane says it was his restaurants first ever shut down by the state, and he insists it will be the last.

“It won’t happen again.”

If you have concerns about a local restaurant with health code violations, e-mail 10News at RedAlert@wtsp.com.

Check out our previous restaurant reports at wtsp.com/redalert.

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