The worst violation types by frequency across Chicago

If you sort Chicago's failed inspections by which violation numbers appear in them, a clear pattern emerges. A handful of violation types account for the bulk of failures across the city. Here's what the data actually shows.

The repeat offenders

Looking across years of failed inspections, these violation numbers appear in the highest percentage of reports:

**Violation 38 (pests):** Appears in roughly 60% of failed inspections in some form. By far the most common citation. Includes everything from "fruit flies in beverage station" to "rat droppings throughout food prep area."

**Violation 22 (cold holding):** Around 45%. Improper cold holding — food at 45–55°F instead of below 41°F — is constant. Often pinned on equipment that's struggling, kitchen layout that overworks the cooler, or doors propped open during prep.

**Violation 23 (hot holding):** About 30%. Often shows up paired with 22 — same kind of issue, different end of the temperature spectrum.

**Violation 33 (cooling methods):** About 28%. Bulk food cooled too slowly. Soup poured into deep containers. Stockpots left to "cool down on the counter" before fridging. Common at restaurants doing heavy prep batches.

**Violation 47 (food contact surfaces):** About 25%. Cutting boards, slicers, prep tables not adequately cleaned between uses.

**Violation 41 (wiping cloth storage):** About 20%. Wet rags left on counters instead of in sanitizer buckets.

What ties these together

Most of these aren't catastrophic on their own — they're "system breakdown" violations. They show up when a kitchen is understaffed, undertrained, or both. The first thing to slip when a kitchen is overwhelmed is the routine stuff: rotating the sanitizer bucket every 30 minutes, taking temperatures every 2 hours, breaking down the slicer for cleaning during slow periods.

So if you see a fail report dominated by these violations, what you're really seeing is a restaurant where the operational systems aren't holding up — usually because of staffing, sometimes because of management.

The "rare but very bad" category

There's a separate group of violations that doesn't show up in the top counts but is much more serious when it does.

**Violation 1 (employee illness):** A sick employee handling food. Usually noticed by the inspector through complaints or firsthand observation. Not common but extremely serious.

**Violation 3 (food sources):** Food coming from unapproved sources. Home-prepared food being sold. Receiving meat without proper labeling. This sometimes triggers an immediate closure.

**Violation 13 (cross-contamination, raw vs ready-to-eat):** Raw chicken stored above produce, raw fish prepped on the same surface as a salad without sanitization. When this is cited, it's usually a serious finding.

**Violation 7 (sewage and wastewater):** Sewage backup, drains not functional. Restaurants get shut down for this on the spot.

These appear in maybe 1–3% of failed reports — but when they do, they often dominate the rest of the report.

Patterns across neighborhoods

We don't see huge geographic differences in *which* violations get cited — kitchens are kitchens, regardless of neighborhood. What we do see is differences in how often these violations are corrected. Higher-priced neighborhoods tend to have higher pass-on-re-inspection rates, partly because they have the labor budget to fix things faster.

But the *types* of citations are remarkably consistent across the city.

What this means for diners

A few practical takeaways:

• **A single 38 violation isn't unusual.** Almost every kitchen gets one eventually. The text matters more than the number.
• **A list of low-number priority citations is unusual.** Multiple priority items in the same inspection means the kitchen's systems are broken, not just slipping.
• **Repeated violation 38 over multiple inspections** — that's the pest-control problem you can't ignore.
• **Repeated violation 22 across inspections** — that's an equipment or training problem, and food held in the danger zone is the actual leading cause of foodborne illness.

The numbers tell a story if you know which ones to read.