Dirty Dining

Finding out which restaurants are clean, and which are not, is the job of local health inspectors like Yvonne Martinez of Nashville, Tenn. They are the public's first line of defense when it comes to restaurant safety. Martinez says restaurant inspectors watch for critical violations.

Martinez: “Improper food temperatures, hygienic practice, improper hand washing, not disinfecting, food equipment or utensils.”

She says those critical violations are more often linked to food born illnesses. However, a critical violation  doesn't necessarily mean someone will get sick. The top priority on her list is checking food holding temperatures.

Martinez: “Anything above 140 degrees is what I'm looking for.”

She wants to make sure hot food is kept hot and cold food kept cold.

Inspector Martinez peeks under the counters and scrutinizes the bathrooms.

The next stop for inspector Martinez is a Nashville Wendy's. The manager would not allow Dateline's camera in, so we waited outside. So how did this Wendy's do? Martinez found two critical violations: improper toxic chemical storage and a broken hose in the sink.

Martinez: “Unfortunately, we do tend to find at least one critical violation in most establishments.”

Next up is Taco Bell. Inspector Martinez weaves through the kitchen with her thermometer poised for action. She makes sure a refrigeration unit is at the right temperature. Holding temps at Taco Bell, she says, are especially important. She says the Taco Bells on her beat usually do very well. She thinks they do a good job training their employees. And this inspection goes well, with no critical violations.

And so it goes. All over the country, every day. hundreds of inspectors like Yvonne Martinez file reports on restaurant operations. For our new survey, Dateline analyzed thousands of those reports on the top ten fast food restaurants in the country. We took our hidden cameras along as we looked behind the counters and into the kitchens of the fast food giants. And we bought a lot of burgers, fries and tacos.

Dateline took our hidden cameras along when we ate at the nation's largest fast food chains. We found many clean, efficient restaurants. But we also found some dirty, unsanitary scenes.  When it comes to fast food horror stories, restaurant inspectors hear it all -- like the story fast food customer Pete Stemen tells. He ate a hair pin -- and he has the pictures to prove it. But where did it come from?

Stemen: “I went to a fast food restaurant, had a breakfast sandwich meal. About 10, 15 minutes later, I started getting really bad heartburn or pain.”

A health inspector investigated. But there was no way to prove whether or not Stemen had swallowed the hair pin at the fast food place, or somewhere else.  But you can't convince Pete Stemen the fast food chain is not at fault.

Stemen: “The fast food worker had her hair up in pins.“

Individual incidents like Stemen's are often difficult to prove. We've seen a lot of complaints in the inspection reports that could not be proven, or disproved -- a roach in a salad, a hair in a milkshake. But inspectors were able to verify these cases:

At a Wendy's in Waukegan, Ill., a customer complained she found glass in her chili. It turned out to be a broken piece of plastic.

At a Hardee's in Midlothian, Va., workers served raw, undercooked chicken tenders to children, and some of them got sick. At another Hardees, an employee was eating and then licking their fingers while filling an order.

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