Every year restaurants around the state get their annual health inspection, and although eating out may be a more convenient option, you lose control of how your food is prepared. What's cooking in these mass productive kitchens could be a recipe for food born illnesses. According to Alfred Burns, sanitation supervisor, there are critical items on the checklist, 13 of them to be exact. These thirteen items ensure that food is in good condition, potentially hazardous food is stored with temperature requirements, cross contamination is prevented, food has not been reused, personnel practices good hygiene, proper sanitation, proper plumbing, and insects and rodents must be kept out. If any eatery is in violation of any of those items and cannot correct them while the inspector is there, they would be asked to close immediately, even if their score is higher than a 70, a score that could still potentially cause food born illnesses.

The Vermont Department of Health rates the restaurant based on a 44 item checklist, and if the establishment gets below a passing grade (70) it will be shut down. So how do local restaurants size up? The VT Department of Health has a public list that includes Vinny's Italian American Restaurant (76), Asia (72), and the Miss Lyndonville Diner (78) all of which failed to comment. With scores such as these, one may think the health department visits these places often; however, that is not the case. Burns says, "We try to get there as often as we can and we only have seven people for the whole state so we have a lot of things to do besides restaurants unfortunately."

Kate Campbell, a resident of Lyndon, feels these popular restaurants scored poorly because, "They're very busy it seems to me as if they probably have that score because they're so busy trying to keep up with their the customers needs that they're not cleaning up as quickly as they should maybe they're falling behind." Although the facts seem unsettling, some residents will not be deterred from their favorite eating spots. Not all restaurants scored poorly. In fact, the Branch Brook Bed and Breakfast and the Village Inn both scored a 100%.

Even though you cannot control what goes on behind closed doors at restaurants, you can control whether or not you eat there. To research your favorite dining places scored just log onto the VT Department of Health's website.

News 7's Jenn Falsetti has the details.