A YouTube video posted by an observant customer has been instrumental in getting a New York bakery closed down. The Dominique Ansel Bakery, home of the cronut, has been shut down by health officials due to an infestation of mice.
Even more shocking, this is the second recent report of a New York City bakery being closed down because of vermin and YouTube. Not sure if we should start calling this mouse-gate or rat-gate.
Earlier, the Social News Daily reported how a New York City Dunkin Donuts was shuttered by the health department after several Youtube videos under the username “pjayone” appeared online. They featured a rat as it traversed racks of donuts and croissants intended for customers.
The NYC Dunkin Donuts was shut down and cited for having a rat infestation, not following proper hand washing procedures and not properly protecting food from contamination.
In the case of the Dominique Ansel Bakery, yet another YouTube video post captured a brief cameo of what was most certainly a mouse as is darted from beneath a rack in the kitchen and scurried under a counter during business hours in the Soho-based bakery.
As a result of the amateur short-film, which appeared on several social media outlets, the Dominique Ansel Bakery was closed down by health officials on Friday.
In an October inspection, the health department cited evidence of vermin, but the Dominique Ansel Bakery still received an A rating. It wasn’t until the YouTube post that, the LA Times says, four public health inspectors showed up and subsequently shut down the bakery.
The Dominique Ansel Bakery opened in New York City in November 2011; founded by Dominique Ansel, a French pastry chef. Since its opening the eponymous bakery has been awarded Time Out New York’s “Best New Bakery of 2012”, Metromix’s “Best Bakery of 2012”, and was Zagat 2013’s highest ranked bakery.
The Cronut is Ansel’s special trademark doughnut and croissant hybrid; made from laminated dough as it is sugared, filled and glazed. The bakery produces a different flavor of the hyped cronut each month.
Noting back to the aforementioned October inspection, at a live auction during the same month, Dominique Ansel, along with auctioneer Nicholas Lowry and Questlove, auctioned a dozen freshly baked Cronuts for $14,000 in less than twenty minutes. The proceeds benefited City Harvest, a New York City food rescue organization, reports the Gothamist.
Taking the health departments actions personally, Ansel issued a statement of his own, quoted by the NY Daily News, that called the shut-down a reflection of his current stature as the “It” boy of American patisserie. “We often feel like we’re being looked at under a tremendous microscope,” he said. “No other bakery would’ve suffered as we did in a similar situation.”
And yet, as seen with the New York City Dunkin Donuts, we can see that is not the case.
There is no word yet as to when the eatery will reopen.
[Photo Credit: YVRBCbro]
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