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The Dartmouth
July 22, 2025 | Latest Issue
The Dartmouth

Health dept. looks at Panda

Panda House restaurant corrected a number of critical sanitation problems in response to an order by New Hampshire's Division of Public Health Services two months ago, but according to department officials, more work needs to be done.

Dr. William Boyle, the Board of Health official responsible for Hanover, said yesterday many of the problems discovered in a previous inspection had been corrected by Nov. 28, but that Panda still needs to educate its staff "in food handling practices."

The Board recommended that Panda "contact a professional pest control company at once" and improve the sanitary conditions of its kitchen after an on-site inspection on Nov. 9.

"Everything is over," Panda House's manager said yesterday. "The customer continues to support our restaurant."

He refused to comment further on the investigations.

The Nov. 28 inspection report, prepared by Sanitarian Gary Quackenbush, stated the main kitchen appeared much cleaner than it did on the day of the first inspection.

But the report said the sushi kitchen was still not clean, raw meats were still not being properly separated from other foods and floors still needed cleaning.

Boyle said the problems occurred because Panda had a "busy fall and had trouble keeping up with the cleanliness of the restaurant."

The Board investigation stemmed from a letter sent to Quackenbush from Hanover resident Donna Schlosser stating that "while eating the pork and mixed vegetables, an insect fell from the box to our serving plate."

"The insect was approximately 1/2 inch long ... and looked like a cockroach. It was dead and appeared to have been cooked with the meal," her letter said.

The Board followed up on the complaint with a inspection of Panda on Nov. 9, in which Boyle said Quackenbush found several "breaks in technique."

Quackenbush wrote in his report that the restaurant had a "severe cockroach problem," food was being stored too close to toxic chemicals and that the kitchen needed cleaning.

"Live roaches were found in the sushi kitchen, on the wok line, in the store room, and when rice and corn starch containers were moved, hundreds of roaches of all sizes were found," his report stated.

And, "a food worker was observed killing cockroaches with his hand (squashing them) and returning to food handling without washing his hands," the report stated.