Food for Thought Report 2.7 - KCBD NewsChannel 11 Lubbock

Two local places are basking in the glory of a perfect score this week. One of our top performers is a new business in town, owned by a former accountant who's no longer using calculators and computers to crunch numbers but mixers and measuring cups to create some of her favorite dishes for others to enjoy.

Specializing in fine food made from scratch, so you can have the taste of homemade without having to make it yourself. Lela's fine foods to go is a NewsChannel 11 Top Performer this week with no critical violations. "I do a lot of cakes, cheesecakes, casseroles, things like that," said Lee.

Owner Lisa Lee says opening Lela's is her dream come true and she's hoping mixing her business sense with her love of baking and cooking is a recipe for success. She also says in addition to high quality ingredients, cleanliness and safety take the cake. "I just feel like it's a reflection on the owner and whoever's doing the cooking and running the business and I want everyone to know I follow the highest safety standards and do things as careful and clean as I can because I want them to know it's not only going to be good but it's going to be safe and their going to enjoy it," said Lee.

Our next top performer is the newest addition to a popular specialty grocery store in town, bringing some fancy fish to the tastebuds of West Texans. Ace Sushi at United Market Street at 3405 50th St. is a NewsChannel 11 Food for Thought Top Performer this week with no critical violations. "We do have some of the raw, we have a lot of the cooked sushi. Ironically only about 10% to 15% of all sushi is raw and the stuff that is raw has to go through a certain procedure so that it's safe for everybody," said Allan Bandy with Market Street.

Safety that's in practice at the Market Street store by the real sushi chefs who prepare it in front of everyone, everyday. They follow strict temperature and cleanliness guidelines to pass healthy and safe food on to you. They're working in a refrigerated area and under supervision and basically they're just turning the product real fast and making sure they're applying the right time and temperature rules and just trying to follow all that, " said Bandy.

Now on to the only Low Performer this week, and it's a local restaurant that's been a Top Performer three times in the past. Furr's Cafeteria at 2802 50th St. received four critical violations. Violations including:

• Improper temperature in a container holding hot food, eggs were found at 122 degrees. Hot food must be heated to 140 degrees or warmer.
• Employees were not washing their hands between job duties.
• Open containers for employee drinks were also found, and hand washing facilities were not accessible.
• Other violations include the storage of soiled equipment, vents on a serving line covered with lint and improper storage of food products.

Management at Furr's said all violations were corrected on site, and the inspection report states that as well.

We also want mention one of the visits conducted by an inspector this week was a re-inspection.
Last week, Arby's at 2422 19th St. was a low performer with five critical violations. This week, during a follow up visit, the report shows all violations have been corrected.