FILTH IN PARK SLOPE: RESTAURANT HEALTH GRADES TRICKLE IN

My least favorite website in the world, worse than fucking Jezebel, is that Health Department site where you search for your favorite restaurants and find out they all have rats. 

Now, the ONLY good thing about this website is that YOU DON'T HAVE TO LOOK AT IT -- So needless to say I was a little ambivalent this past summer when I heard about the Health Department's plan to make you look at their restaurant ratings by requiring owners to post them in their entrance windows. 

Here was my concern: Maybe publicly-displayed restaurant health grades are like those horrendous calorie counts on FIVE GUYS' menus, or like the details of the water-boarding process that the US government uses to keep us safe: Maybe I'm just WAY happier not knowing!

So while walking up and down 7th ave over the last couple of months, I've been somewhat hesitant to look too closely at restaurant windows: I've started to dread, somewhat, the impending letter-grade invasion.

Especially in the last few weeks, I've definitely noticed that the placards are starting to trickle in. It doesn't seem all that bad yet, but maybe that's because there's one unsettling factor that keeps it from seeming real: How come all the ratings I've seen are just a bunch of fucking A's!? Why isn't even the shittiest Mexican rat-hole sporting AT LEAST a goddamn B?

Well TODAY I discovered the answer, thanks to the NY Post's hard-hitting coverage of VerminGate.  (Shocking spoiler: Restaurants have accidentally been forgetting to post their shiny-new 'C' letter-grade certificates in storefront windows next to their 'Zagat-rated' plaques and take-out menus.) 

So for the sake of journalism, as much as it makes my nuts hurt to read about how the food I eat is  prepared in rodent-excrement, I just HAD to go back to my least-favorite website to see what these Park Slope fuckers have been hiding.

Here's a listing of the Park Slope results carrying the biggest WOW factor; not the ones that are necessarily the WORST, but more like unexpected twists of surprise, e.g. "WOW, "Sette" is a rat-hole?" or "DAMN, PURITY diner is getting a mutherfuckin A*??"

*Speaking of Purity diner, more on that scene after the jump...

Results Format: Restaurant : Rating Result as of last inspection [letter grade that rating would translate to]

• Brooklyn Burger Bar: 2 [A]  (That shitwhole is getting a fuckin A???)
• Purity Diner: 3 [A]  (WHAAAA??? Mind fucking BLOWN)
• Tea Lounge: 6 [A] (Holy shit, is this real life? They must not be counting bedbugs.)
• Royal Fried Chicken King: 11 [A] (Not fucking possible. Misprint. Want to see Royal Fried Chicken's ass? This is it, on 5th ave:

So this cockhole is getting an A and Sette is getting a C- ? Get the fuck outta here, we need a new system.

• Bonnie's Grill: 28 [C] (I guess that's not so surprising, but it IS a fuckin bummer.)
• Scalino: 32 [C] (fuck, that blows, love(d) that place.)
• Southpaw: 35 [C] (meh, who gives a shit - do they even have food? What are the rats going to do, take a dump on some pretentious surf rock band or Dan Zanes?)
• Fonda: 47 [C] (Heartbreaking. Really the best Mexican food ever.) 
• Sette: 51 [C] (What can ya say; It's a shanda. I thought I knew 'em so well! Saw 'em walkin' around just the other day - he was fine. Total tragedy.)
• Anthony's Pizza: 52 [C-] (NOOOOOOOOOOOO that place is my fucking STAPLE!)

If you're a glutton for punishment and need to see the whole list, just go here and type in 11215.

Now without further ado, here's my Purity Diner story:

For years (2003-2010) Purity Diner was my absolute haunt. Used to bring my kids there for breakfast each weekend as a family tradition. We knew the waitstaff, tipped like the richest of goys, etc etc.

Even in those glory days though, I knew: it was completely obvious that the place was a total health hazard. I'm not sure why I looked the other way for all those years - it must be because I never had the actual violations revealed and SPELLED out for me. (Thanks again, Internet.)

But this summer, in the midst of the letter-grade announcement hysteria, I finally checked the site. When I saw that Purity had the #1 WORST HEALTH RECORD in all of park slope history, bar NONE,  I vowed I could never go back there again:

Fast forward to today: It's getting a motherfucking A. See, when this plan was first announced, there were small business owners who argued tooth and nail against this new Health Department shaming policy. They argued that only McDonald's and Starbucks and other chains could ever afford to comply with the insane demands of publicly posted placards.

But LISTEN god damnit - do you see the greatness of survival instinct? Of capitalism? Of America? If this aggressive approach brought Purity Diner back from the brink of roaches and rats, well fuck if it can't one day do the same for a little vermin-ridden hole on 3rd street; a vermin-ridden hole called Sette.