Vegas Dirty Dining: Cantina Cancun repeat offender edition

Darcy Spears of Action 13 News reports the latest Dirty Dining headliner is a repeat offender. It’s been three years since their first appearance, but records show they’re still dirty.

dirty_dining__expired_food__roaches_at_r_0_45893867_ver1-0_640_480The last time we were at this location for Dirty Dining, one of the owners shoved a newspaper into the camera lens, pushed the photographer out and locked Spears in.

That was March 2013.

That’s when the new owners first took over the restaurant on Maryland Parkway between Reno and Tropicana avenues.

It was called Ahogadas Cancun. It’s now called Cantina Cancun.

This time, things were much more quiet.

Turns out Cantina Cancun is closed on Tuesdays. That’s their choice, but on Aug. 26, they were forced to shut down after health inspectors gave them 42 demerits.

Forty-two is enough to shut a place down on demerits alone. But Cantina Cancun added the imminent health hazard of no hot water.

They also had live roaches.

When we contacted, the person who answered disconnected and it went to voicemail when we called back. We spoke to someone again later and left more messages, but never got any answers.

Health inspectors found expired food, including multiple seafood items, cheese and beans that should have been tossed more than a week before the inspection. But it was all still sitting in the fridge.

There was also lots of food that had to be thrown out because of unsafe temperatures, utensils that hadn’t been washed since the day before, and the stove had excessive build-up. The person in charge couldn’t tell the inspector the last time it was cleaned.

Of the four imminent health hazard closures, the grossest pictures came from the food truck that serves as the pool snack bar at the Plaza hotel-casino.

It was shut down for lack of adequate refrigeration. Just about every food in the facility was at an unsafe temperature.

Plus, inspectors found multiple foods with “Severe signs of spoilage.”

There’s a salad made with feta cheese and cucumber at the top of the menu. But cucumbers on the truck were discolored, spotted with mold and squishy.

And their large container of feta cheese had expired in February.

The Oscar burger comes topped with arugula, but that was wilted, brown and deteriorating.

Cantina Cancun grill is back to an A grade.