A Cork restaurant and takeaway was ordered to close its doors last month after inspectors found mice droppings “throughout the kitchen” and in a container storing cleaning equipment.
Press Up Eats, at 4-5 South Main Street in Cork City, was one of several businesses served with closure orders by food safety officials in March.
The food business, part of the wider Press Up Hospitality Group, claims on its website to offer “the ultimate takeaway experience”, with customers able to order their “favourite dishes from some of Ireland’s leading restaurants”.
Details published by the Food Safety Authority of Ireland (FSAI) on Tuesday said mice droppings were noted “at wall to floor junctions throughout the kitchen” in Press Up Eats, and under fridges, storage shelving and cooking equipment.
The inspector also found evidence of “pest nesting”, and said “significant accumulations” of mice droppings were seen in a wall panel in the kitchen next to the wash hand basin.
All of this presented “a grave and immediate danger to public health,” the report said.
It is believed that Press Up Eats has reopened again after the food safety issues were rectified. Press Up has been approached for comment.
Dead rodent on shop floor
Elsewhere, a Waterford food retailer was forced to shut after inspectors found a dead rodent on a box of crisps on the shop floor.
Rodent droppings were also found in various areas throughout Asian Food Babak, trading at Unit 5A, Park Road Business Park, Waterford, including “under packets of Vermicelli noodles on shop shelving” and in food presses in the staff canteen.
The closure order said the situation posed “a grave and immediate danger to public health” due to the risk of rodents transmitting harmful pathogens through droppings and urine.
India's Taste, a takeaway restaurant at 17-19 Summerhill Parade, Dublin 1, also received a closure order in March after breaching several regulations.
A food hygiene inspection report said there was no wash hand basin provided in the kitchen, and no hot water supply at the basins in the staff toilet. Containers of vegetables, cooked chicken and cooked lamb were stored overnight and uncovered in an open display unit, while the standard of cleanliness in the kitchen was described as “very poor”.
Dr Pamela Byrne, chief executive of the FSAI, reminded businesses of the legal requirement to follow food safety practices.
“It is simply not good enough that there continues to be such grave and serious disregard of basic food safety procedures,” she said.
“Several of the Closure Orders reference significant rodent infestations. This is not acceptable in any food business at any time, as it poses a serious risk to public health.”
