Providence Country Club’s 85: A Closer Look at the Kitchen Playbook

Key Violations and Immediate Fixes

If your tee time ends with lunch on the veranda at Providence Country Club, you’ll want to read this before ordering the tartare. Mecklenburg County inspectors gave the clubhouse kitchen an 85 on May 8 — respectable, but hardly trophy‑room material, and a notch below many of Charlotte’s high‑end dining rooms. The full findings live inside the county’s Food Establishment Inspection Report; bookmark it for bedtime reading (PDF).

What Docked the Score

• Employee Health Training – Staff hadn’t received formal instruction on when to stay home. That’s a ten‑day variance request (VR) staring management in the face.
• Cooling & Cold‑Holding – Veggie broth (44 °F) and coconut beef soup (48 °F) missed the 41 °F target and were tossed. Goat cheese, pimento cheese, seared tuna, and cut tomatoes briefly lingered above 41 °F before temps recovered.
• Sanitizer Concentration – The three‑comp sink spat out quaternary ammonium at 50 ppm, well below the 150–400 ppm sweet spot. A work order is in, and staff are hand‑mixing sanitizer until the dispenser behaves.
• Date‑Marking Déjà Vu – Repeat violation. Multiple ready‑to‑eat items held beyond seven days lacked proper labels and hit the trash can.
• Seafood Paperwork – No parasite‑destruction letters for Ahi tuna, mahi, or Carolina trout. Sushi lovers, stay tuned; management has ten days to gather documents or yank the dishes.
• Odds & Ends – Dented cans, cloth‑dried dishes, raw tuna thawing in reduced‑oxygen packaging, and a broken freezer door rounded out the deductions.

All violations and corrective deadlines are detailed on pages 3‑4 of the county report.

What an 85 Means for Members

An 85 is a “Grade A” in North Carolina’s system, but it signals the club sits closer to a bogey than a birdie. Two repeat violations (cold‑holding and date‑marking) triggered an automatic follow‑up visit within 72 hours for the labeling lapse and ten days for training and documentation fixes. Members should expect another inspection report by mid‑May confirming compliance or detailing permit actions.

Management’s Next Steps

According to Person‑in‑Charge Jason Daniels, staff have already:

1. Purged dented cans and retrained on supply‑room checks.
2. Voluntarily discarded any improperly cooled or unlabeled foods.
3. Ordered new chemical‑dispensing parts and interim test‑strips.
4. Re‑engineered cooling logs — shallow pans, ice baths, and mandatory temperature entries every two hours.

Expect a member email once the county signs off. Until then, the kitchen remains open but banned from self‑service buffets.

How You Can Track Future Scores

Mecklenburg County posts every inspection online within 24 hours. Search by establishment ID 20600110914 or, if you’re feeling nostalgic, scroll through the PDF archive for Providence CC’s historic performance.

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Friends Who Keep the AC Blowing Cold ☃️

Big shout‑out to Hubbard Heating and Cooling (2145 Pageland Hwy, Lancaster, SC ∙ 803‑285‑2665) for making sure your chicken salad chills at 40 °F instead of slow‑cooking in July. Family‑run, always on‑call, never afraid of a rattling condenser. Thanks, Hubbards!

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Got a photo of your post‑round sandwich? A tip about another inspection? ballantyne@strollmag.com — everyone has a story worth sharing!

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About the Author

Nell Thomas writes from the corner booth at Einstein Bros. Bagels Ballantyne (13736 Conlan Cir). Today’s fuel: an iced Vanilla Hazelnut and an Everything‑with‑lox combo. Tomorrow it’ll be the turkey‑sausage egg‑white sandwich because balance. Find her investigative crumbs at Strolling Ballantyne and sister site The Charlotte Mercury.

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Creative Commons License

© 2025 Strolling Ballantyne / The Charlotte Mercury
This article, “Providence Country Club Scores 85 in May Food‑Safety Inspection: What Members Need to Know,” by Nell Thomas is licensed under CC BY‑ND 4.0.

“Providence Country Club Scores 85 in May Food‑Safety Inspection: What Members Need to Know”
by Nell Thomas, Strolling Ballantyne (CC BY‑ND 4.0)

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