To Our Customers & Communities:
First and foremost, please know that it is completely safe to visit and enjoy food at our restaurants.
Recently, Brent’s Deli was mentioned in a news story about the effectiveness of food safety inspections. This story included people who reported dining at our restaurant in Westlake Village last summer and were confirmed to have Salmonella.
As a family-run business that serves hundreds of customers daily at our Westlake Village location, the news of even one person becoming sick as a result of dining at our restaurant is deeply concerning and unacceptable. We have always placed an extremely high priority on providing people with a terrific dining experience, which includes our unwavering focus on food safety and quality control.
Our mission has always been to consistently maintain a completely safe, family-friendly experience for everyone that enjoys our food – which includes our kids and family members, our employees (some of whom have been with us for more than 40 years), and anyone else. While we do our best to maintain such an experience, we are also committed to being transparent and honest when issues arise – and most importantly, to legitimately correct these issues.
We invite you to read our most recent Ventura County health report. As with every restaurant, all of our health reports are available to the public, and you are certainly welcome to read those as well.
Our Response To Last Summer’s Salmonella Cases
Immediately after being notified by Ventura County health officials last summer that customers may have became ill after eating at our restaurant, we worked diligently with these officials to evaluate our food safety practices, and immediately addressed and corrected all of their directives. Please know that at no time were we required by health officials to close our store. We appreciate Ventura County’s efforts to promote food and dining safety, and we are committed to working with them during future routine inspections.
To ensure the safety of our customers and employees, we took the following steps:
- We voluntarily closed our Westlake Village location for one evening to have the entire restaurant thoroughly cleaned and sanitized by a third-party cleaning company.
- We took the additional step of hiring the services of UL Everclean, consultants who specialize in food safety audits, assessments and trainings for the restaurant industry.
- In addition to the regular audits by Ventura County health officials, UL Everclean regularly conducts unexpected audits of our food safety practices – from testing how food is handled and prepared, to reviewing serving practices, and evaluating food prep and storage areas – and works with us to implement any necessary changes and additional employee training.
Our Commitment To You
We have always been focused on complete customer satisfaction and providing a high-quality experience to the thousands of loyal customers who visit our locations in Westlake Village and Northridge. Even in the best of times, we are continuously seeking improvement – and will continue to take a hands-on approach in order to (a) prevent similar situations from happening in the future and (b) put our customers’ safety first, always. Simply put: You deserve nothing less.
We want to make sure that every visit to Brent’s Deli is superb. Should you experience anything less, please contact us at wecare@brentsdeli.com.
– The Peskin & Hernandez Families
