Yoshinoya's Beijing branches using dirty dishes, stale rice
Staff Reporter 2013-03-17 08:58
A Yoshinoya branch in China. (Photo/CFP)
Employees at two branches of Japanese restaurant chain Yoshinoya in Beijing were found serving customers unclean eating utensils and reused steamed rice this week.
Reporters found employees at the two branches — one at Ginza Mall in Dongzheng District and another at SoShow Entertainment Shopping Center — often used bowls to drink water and did not wash them before serving soup to customers. Trays which should be washed daily were left untouched for a week. Portion sizes for steamed rice in the set meals were mysteriously shrinking after 3pm, according to Want Daily, our Chinese-language sister newspaper.
They did not dispose of cooked rice in accordance with the restaurant's policy. Tags stating the time that the steamed rice was cooked are attached to rice cookers in Yoshinoya branches. If the rice is not served to customers by a certain time, it should be discarded. However, the staff at the two shady branches changed not the rice but the time tags to avoid the work.
Undercover reporters who applied for positions at the branches were also granted jobs without providing results from a mandatory health check.
Hong Kong-listed Hop Hing Group, which operates Yoshinoya branches in Beijing, formally apologized for the scandal on Saturday. The operations of branches involved in the scandal have been suspended, according to Guangzhou Daily.
Yoshinoya branches in Guangzhou and Shenzhen said their meals and utensils meet company standards. Meals are made after customers place orders and leftovers go straight into the trash bin. All the branches have a dish-washing machine and a dish sterilizer. Their utensils are sterilized before reuse.
Health checks are mandatory at branches in Guangzhou, whether employees come on for temporary or full-time work. Branches are routinely subjected to random examinations by the local food and drug authorities, according to Guangzhou newspapers.
