25 Chicago students arrested for a middle-school food fight
The cafeteria food fight, as immortalized in the 1978 film, Animal House, has become a high school rite of passage.
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Except in Chicago (home to John Belushi, right)
The New York Times reports this morning that 25 students, ages 11 to 15, were rounded up, arrested, taken from school and put in jail on charges of reckless conduct, a misdemeanor, after a food fight at the middle-school campus of Perspectives Charter Schools, in the Gresham neighborhood on the South Side.
That was last Thursday afternoon. Now parents are questioning what seem to them like the criminalization of age-old adolescent pranks, and the lasting legal and psychological impact of the arrests.
“My children have to appear in court,” Erica Russell, the mother of two eighth-grade girls who spent eight hours in jail, said Tuesday. “They were handcuffed, slammed in a wagon, had their mug shots taken and treated like real criminals.”
You barf, you pay; $50 vomit tax for Chicago cabs?
Chicago cab drivers are demanding that riders who throw up in their cabs get slapped with a $50 fee.
The cabbies said Thursday they want to the city impose the penalty because of the work -- and hours lost -- that comes with cleaning a passenger's vomit.
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Mayor Richard Daley said his administration will listen to the drivers' request and review their recommendations.
Warning: This sandwich may contain a gold earring
A Chicago man is suing McDonald's for injuries he sustained when he swallowed a gold earring that was in his sandwich.
The complaint asserts, among other things, that the sandwich "lacked any warning of the fact that it contained the gold earring" and that McDonald's "failed to prevent foreign objects not fit for human consumption, including but not limited to earrings, from being offered to the general public in the food being served."
Singing songs of handwashing
Children’s Memorial Hospital and the Chicago Children’s Choir are teaming up to record a handwashing song. Chicago native Joel Frankel wrote the song, “Wash, Rinse Dry.” The singers will record at SPACE Recording Studio in Evanston. The song and video will be used for patient and staff education. And don’t forget, JJ the puppet will be joining the singers during the recording session.
Obama also says, if you're sick, stay at home
It’s not swine flu, it’s people coming to work when they’re barfing. I understand it’s probably not the person’s fault – they may get fired if they don’t show up. But barfing employees should not be serving food. And that’s exactly what happened to 46 other employees at a Des Plaines, Ill., company last week.
The 46 workers at UOP, a manufacturing technology company, were infected by a norovirus -- a stomach bug -- that apparently was carried by a food service worker at the firm, said Amy Poore, a spokeswoman for the Cook County Department of Public Health.
Ways to get a restaurant closed: killing mice with cooking utensils
A customer at the Nigerian Kitchen, 1363 W. Wilson, Chicago, called 311 after claiming to see staff using cooking utensils to kill mice.
The restaurant was closed Monday after city health inspectors found mouse feces throughout the restaurant, cockroaches crawling on a wall and wastewater backing up from three clogged sinks in the kitchen.
Inspectors also found a mop sink filled with dozens of tomatoes and green peppers -- cut and whole -- and ordered them discarded,
Chicagoans who believe a restaurant or other licensed food establishment is operating in an unsafe manner are encouraged to call 311.
Listeriosis leads to 2 miscarriages in Chicago area
Recalls of food contaminated with listeria are fairly common. Today, it's sandwiches in Western Canada and frozen dough in Israel.
Also today, a reminder of why information about listeria needs to be rapidly, widely and creatively distributed.
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Three pregnant Hispanic women in Chicago and suburban Cook County tested positive for listeriosis after becoming ill in late November and December, according to a release from the Illinois Department of Public Health.
All three women reported eating different types of soft cheese, the release said. One woman delivered her baby, who also tested positive for listeriosis, but the other two suffered miscarriages.
"It is very important that pregnant women and people with weakened immune systems avoid eating foods that are more likely to contain the Listeria bacteria, such as soft cheeses -- including Brie, feta and Mexican style soft or semi-soft cheese -- unless the product clearly states it is made with pasteurized milk," Dr. Damon state director of public health, said in the release.
Pregnant women are about 20 times more likely than other healthy adults to get listeriosis. About a third of all reported cases in Illinois happen during pregnancy. Infection during pregnancy may result in spontaneous abortion during the second and third trimesters, or stillbirth.
Chicago's Wiener's Circle closed after inspection
A Chicago eatery famous for “its rambunctious late-night crowd and foul-mouthed staff,” was closed after an inspection Thursday.
Wiener's Circle, an iconic hot dog stand on the North Side, was shut down by the city today after inspectors found several food safety violations, including finding no hot running water at the Lincoln Park restaurant. …
The inspection followed an inspection Dec. 12 after a customer called 311, claiming the restaurant had a rodent infestation. There was no evidence found of rodents, the release stated, but management was ticketed for having an overflowing garbage container.
1,000 rat feces close Chicago restaurant
Chicago repeat restaurant inspection violator, Bar Louie at 741 W. Randolph, was shut down Thursday and remains closed today after Chicago Department of Public Health inspectors discovered over 1,000 rat feces in a basement storage area.
Additionally, the restaurant was cited for front and rear doors with gaps that allow access to rodents and insects, fruit flies in the kitchen, a poorly maintained outside garbage area (with trash overflowing onto the ground), no sanitizing solution in the automatic dishwashing machine, and no hot water at sinks through the establishment.
CDPH Commissioner Terry Mason, M.D., said,
“We take food safety seriously, and these are the types of unacceptable violations that leave the door wide open for food borne illness. Bar Louie will not be allowed to re-open until it has taken corrective action and passed re-inspection.”
The enforcement action was the 203rd time in 2008 that Health Department inspectors have shut a food establishment for violations of the Chicago Health Code.
Representatives of Bar Louie will have to explain themselves at an administrative hearing on November 6 and pay a fine expected to total $2,000.
Bar Louie has 11 locations in the Chicago area, six in the city itself. Three of the city locations have been shut down this year for health violations. The Hyde Park location was shut down on October 1 by the Mayor’s Dumpster Task Force, and the Taylor Street location was shut down by CDPH on August 28.
Lawsuit alleges man gets 9-foot tapeworm from seafood restaurant
The first salmon Amy cooked for me – she caught me a delicious salmon – was damn near raw. Now, we cook it to about 125 F, checked using a tip-sensitive digital thermometer, and it warms up to 130-140 F in the minutes from grill to gullet.
Apparently that didn’t happen for Anthony Franz, who is suing the parent company of Shaw’s Crab House for causing him to become “violently ill” after eating undercooked salmon at the trendy River North restaurant.
The Chicago Sun-Times reports that the suit, filed Monday in Cook County Circuit Court, claims Franz ate periodically at Shaw’s between May and August 2006 as part of a healthier diet.
For several days, Franz became violently ill and eventually passed a nine-foot long tapeworm, the suit said.
A suburban doctor he visited in late August said he got the tapeworm from eating undercooked fish. …
He claims in the two-count suit that the restaurant failed to supervise employees in safe food handling and allowed customers to eat food that was not safe to consume.
Raw and undercooked seafood continues to present risks. The N.Y. Times covered the issue of tapeworms in seafood in a 1981 article.
Stick it in.
Chicago's Soul Queen shut
The Chicago Department of Health says that one of the oldest and most famous restaurants in the city was shut down after Chicago Department of Public Health (CDPH) inspectors discovered a rodent infestation and other critical violations of the city health code.
Soul Queen Restaurant, 9031 S. Stony Island, was shut down after inspectors found numerous mouse feces throughout the kitchen, dining room and storage areas.
The restaurant also was cited for storing food at unsafe temperatures, in a faulty walk-in cooler—resulting in inspectors ordering management to discard six dozen eggs and 30 lbs. of raw chicken.
Soul Queen also was cited for a leaky automatic dishwashing machine, raw sewage coming up through a floor drain near its hand washing sink, grease oozing from the grease trap under the three-compartment sink, no certified food manager on duty, an outside garbage dumpster overflowing with trash, and an outside grease box encrusted with grease.
Today’s inspection was triggered by a customer who called 311 to report seeing three live mice in the restaurant. No live mice were observed today.
Chicagoans who believe that a restaurant or any other licensed food establishment is operating in an unsafe manner are encouraged to call 311 and report it.
Mice close Chicago Whole Foods
As you already know, the Health Department closed our store after finding that we did not fully comply with a few concerns they had, including evidence of mice."
The Chicago Tribune reports that a Whole Foods on North Avenue, in one of Chicago's wealthiest neighborhoods, was found with mouse feces in the back room and a dead mouse in a glue trap.
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Some expressed themselves on the Tribune's Web site:•"This is what happens when grocery stores are run by hippies who don't believe in pesticide."
•"Why can't mice have an organic experience too? I am shocked that an attorney has not filed a class suit because Whole Foods did not provide adequate bathroom facilities for the mice."
•"Sadly, if Whole Foods packaged [the droppings] nicely as a topping for toast points and charged $10.99 per ounce, the lemming snobs would probably buy it."
Would you like sewage with that? Chicago Quiznos shut down
CDPH was alerted to the situation by a motorist who called 311 last night to allege that Quiznos’ staff was disposing of the sewage by shoveling it out their back door and into an alley. No evidence of that activity was found by CDPH inspectors today.Quiznos will remain closed until its management has corrected the violation and passed re-inspection.
Representatives of the Quiznos franchise will have to explain themselves at an administrative hearing on April 17 and pay a fine expected to total $750.
Chicagoans who believe that a sandwich shop or other food establishment is operating in an unsafe manner are encouraged to dial 311 and report it.
Serving tainted turkey may not improve employee relations
Megan McCarthy, a United spokeswoman, was cited as saying the entire meal for one of the day-shift crews was dumped Thursday morning after staff discovered that the "turkey was not edible."Management gave the airport employees $10 gift certificates for the airports' food vendors to make up for the loss of the meal.
