I've Eaten There Before...

[Paolo]

http://www.bannergraphic.com/story/1287130.html

La Charreada was packed with customers Friday evening, just hours after the Board of Health allowed the restaurant to reopen after inspectors closed the restaurant down when they found a deer carcass in the kitchen. This is the second time the Board of Health has closed the Greencastle Mexican restaurant in three years.

Putnam County health inspectors cited the restaurant at 1360 Indianapolis Rd. for bringing a deer into the kitchen and butchering it, using food obtained from an unapproved source, not protecting the food in the kitchen from contamination, allowing the employees to handle the deer and allowing business to continue in the presence of a "gross unsanitary occurrence and condition," according to the inspection report.

Socrates Montano, a district manager and member of the family that owns La Charreada and 32 other Mexican restaurants in Indiana and Arkansas, said the employees who were responsible for bringing the deer into the restaurant have been fired and that the kitchen has been thoroughly cleaned since the carcass was removed. He denied that the employees butchered the deer in the restaurant.

Inspectors said they showed up at La Charreada Wednesday afternoon after they received a complaint about the carcass, said Environmental Health Specialist Darrell Brackney. Montano said the complaint came from an electrician who happened to be in the kitchen at the time.

When they arrived, they found "a few" people, presumably employees, standing around a gutted, headless, skinned deer carcass that was lying on the floor, Brackney said.

Montano said Department of Natural Resources officers who were friends with one of the employees brought the deer, which had been hit and killed by a car, to the restaurant at the request of the employee. That employee and another then carried the deer into the kitchen.

At no point did employees intend to serve venison from the carcass to customers, Brackney said. The employee was, however, butchering the animal on the floor and large pieces of meat had been cut from the carcass, said Brackney and Board of Health Administrator Beth Glaze, both of whom took part in the inspection.

"That is a lie," Montano said of the health department's assertion that employees were butchering the deer.

He said he was not in the restaurant Wednesday, and maintained that the employee was just storing it until he could bring it home..

Brackney said they shut down La Charreada on the spot because it was an "imminent threat to public health."

This was only the fifth restaurant closing in Putnam County that Glaze has seen in her nine years at the Board of Health, she said.

It remained closed for the rest of the day Wednesday and all of Thursday before reopening Friday afternoon.

Health inspectors talked with the owners of the restaurant and made them throw out all food that was in the kitchen when the deer was brought in. They also reinspected the facility before allowing it to reopen.

As a result of the health code violation, La Charreada will be on probation for six months, during which time health inspectors will visit the kitchen once a week to make sure it is staying within health code. The owners also face a fine for the infraction, though the amount has not yet been determined, Glaze said.

In response to the violation, owners fired the two employees who brought the deer into the kitchen and are reviewing security camera tape from the kitchen to determine whether the manager should be fired as well, Montano said.

Both men were waiters and were not responsible for preparing food, he added.

Douglas S. Ehman, a Public Health Coordinator for the county who took part in the follow-up inspection, said he is confident that the restaurant is safe to eat at and that there are no particular precautions that anyone who dined there Wednesday needs to take.

Despite this, Glaze said she would have reservations about taking her family there to eat.

"They would have to gain my trust again because they've lost my trust," she said.

Diners walking into and out of La Charreada Friday evening seemed to take the restaurant's closure in stride.

Doug and Lyndsay, who were about to enter La Charreada, said they were unaware of the restaurant's health code violations, but they shrugged off the news and decided to eat there anyway.

Hey A-1, wanna have lunch this week?!

Sort reminds me of Granny's road kill surprise! And I'm not kiddin'!

[tugon (imported)]

There are several restaurants in Quebec City that serve wild game. One evening I ordered a duck entree and the waiter came back to apologize that they were out of duck. He said the hunters had not yet returned. I thought he was being clever now I would like to see the kitchen.

[kristoff]

There are several restaurants in Quebec City that serve wild game. One evening I ordered a duck entree and the waiter came back to apologize that they were out of duck. He said the hunters had not yet returned. I thought he was being clever now I would like to see the kitchen.

Can't speak to your area, but generally if a restaurant is established for wild game, and they want to serve their own catch, they have to have a certified butcher shop, and proper food inspections, on premise or elsewhere.

[Blaise (imported)]

An excellent restaurant that serves wild game is less than mile from where I live. They don’t butcher on site, however!

[A-1 (imported)]

Paolo.

Maybe, but not next week. Full schedule.

[Riverwind (imported)]

Paolo, do you think the health inspector might me just a bit over the top on this one?

Rats, mice, cockroaches running around the kitchen I would have a problem but, yes, they were wrong, I guess we should just take them out and shoot them.

River

[Paolo]

I have no problem with this, actually. I just found it a sensational story that I thought I'd share.

My 2nd nephew is constantly bringing home dead animals which he has hunted, which we then clean and cook. Last year, he maxed out his youth license on deer. I think it was 6 or 8...I spent a bloody fortune at the processor's for them, too. However, the kitchen of a large restaurant is hardly the place for a deer carcass. People who aren't used to dead meat sitting around tend to get upset.

[FianceeUvBigGuy (imported)]

Yoli here...at home nursing an injury...sniffle.

As most of you know, I am an avid huntress and fisherchick. Most times, when I shoot Bambi or one of his relatives, I do the field-dressing (See: Gutting) myself UNLESS some Sir Galahad wannabe says "Hey, little lady, you just stand back and look away. Can't have a lady doing this sort of thing."

That means I don't get to cut the you-can-guess-whats off the bucks...darn it!

I can understand the sanctions imposed for having non-USDA inspected meat in the restaurant. Although the carcass of a healthy deer poses no threat, if that is allowed then where will it end?

At two of BigGuy's ranches there are walk-in refrigerated "lockers" where we hang the carcasses until they are butchered. Even here at the "Big House" there is a small walk-in adjacent to the mud room so that we can actually hang game or large beef quarters.

We do our own slicing and dicing for the most part and usually a few of us make a party out of it. We even make our own venison/wild piggie sausage and jerky (not my specialty, but one of our friends makes great jerky.)

There are certain animals I do NOT want to deal with, post-mortem. I don't mind skinning a rattlesnake..."just like chicken"...and I will do rabbits, fish, ducks, and squirrels. Wild hogs and javelina, however, are on my "No way, Jose'" list. Javelina (no, they are NOT wild pigs, they are a seperate critter...actually a Peccary.) stink to high heaven due to a bewbie-like musk gland on their lower back and wild hogs are just plain nasty (But when properly prepared...Yummo!)

My aversion to the hogs does not preclude me from shooting them by the dozens, however. Y'see, many parts of Texiz are overrun by them and they destroy crops, kill and eat domestic animals...small calves, sheep, goats, etc, as well as fawns, young quail, turkey, ducklings, and other defenseless critters. They are considered predators and breed like rabbits. They've killed a few humans as well. According to a trapped hog I once interviewed just before he was executed we "taste just like chicken."...no kidding!

Most ranches have standing orders in place that decree that all hogs will be shot on sight. Most are consumed, either by the hunters or folks to whom they are donated. Some are left to the coyotes and buzzards.

Javelina (Peccaries) are inoffensive little guys, rarely over 50 pounds, and we prefer to leave them alone. They won't bother you if you don't corner or frighten them. I've walked right through a herd of them while on a quail hunt and they just said "Howdy" and let me pass. I was armed with my cute 'lil Bereta over-under 28 gauge but those tiny quail loads would not have saved my adorable hiney had they gotten hostile. They have some serious tusks. (I did feel a sudden need to tinkle, I'll admit.)

Some folks keep "pet" javelinas inside fences surrounding ranch houses. They are amazingly loyal to those who raised them but woe betide anyone who enters without invitation.

Well, once again, I ramble.

Oh, my "injury"? Well, seems your correspondent twisted her ankle in the parking garage at work y'day. Guess who tenderly cared for me. You guessed it...our Security Amazon. She even drove me to the Doc-In-The-Box and brought me home.

Soooo, I'm "working"...riiiight...at home, in the big house 'cause I can't get up the stairs to the carriage house apartment Ash(leigh) and I share here on BigGuy's estate. Ash(leigh) has taken the day off from her duties and is spoiling me rotten (and rightly so! Don't you all agree?)

I should be sufficiently healed to make the trip to Norman USA to see our beloved Sooners drive another nail in the Texiz Aand/orM head coach's career coffin this Saturday night. The game's on ABC Prime Time...look for me on a screen near YOU!

Hmmmm...given all the special...ummm...interests found here in the EA I wonder if anyone would be lit up by the sight of a little foot, with newly polished toenails peeping from an Ace bandage. No? OK.

Love to all, and All for Yoli!

Yoli the Gimp in San Antonio Texiz

[captainnemo (imported)]

Wild animals are usually not accepted in restaurants by the health inspectors because of the multitude of diseases associated with wild game, ranging from slow acting viruses like scrapie (similar to kuru, BSE and Alzheimers) to various and sundry ectoparasites (yes, those friendly little vampiric critters that make us all itch so just thinking about them)--and don't get me started on the many parasitic worms. If you guys hunt, make sure that you cook the meat well done so that you will continue to thrive and play.

[twaddler (imported)]

I think deer tastes gamey and awful. :/ Though I suppose most of the venison I've eaten has come from the area surrounding Dow Chemical. Hmmm...