Dillinger’s, a longtime staple of the Bushwick breakfast scene, was closed by city health inspectors after hazardous food storage conditions and dirty utensils were found on the premises last month, according to city records.
The Russian cafe on Evergreen Avenue near Jefferson Street was shut down after the Department of Health reported four major health code violations on Sept. 18., Patch reported.
Inspectors said they found tainted food, poorly refrigerated food storage units, poor plumbing, and no place to wash dirty utensils.
As you probably know, a violation point system determines the letter grades of restaurants—scores between zero and 13 earn an A, scores between 14 and 27 earn a B, and scores above 28 give eateries a C and all the delights of the health department’s careful scrutiny.
The Bushwick coffee shop failed a September inspection with 73 points, which would probably have earned it an F–if such a grade existed.
Back in 2013, Bushwick Daily reported on the opening of Dillinger’s and its “raven-eyed and luxurious” owners, Mary Kaushansky and Ksyenya Roz, Brooklyn transplants born in the former Soviet Union.
While the two owners of Dillinger’s (were) are good cooks and charming decorators, they professed to be anything but great renovators—and it seems that hasn’t changed.
The restaurant did not reply to a request for comment, but blamed the shutdown on #unscrupulousbushwicklandlordproblems in an Instagram post with a photo of a weeping Michael Jordan.
“We are temp closed today due to a building permit related issue,” Dillinger’s wrote on Sept. 19, one day after the health inspection. “We are working on resolving the problem so that we can be back up and running ASAP.”
Department of Buildings records show the building was cited twice for the illegal occupation of the building’s cellar on Sept. 20 and Aug. 24.
Cover image courtesy of Dillinger’s