Cooked?
Lava Shawarma
- gradeGrade B
- inspection score22 pts
- critical violations3
- last inspectedOctober 7, 2025
- address226 Thompson Street, Manhattan 10012
- cuisineMiddle Eastern
- phone6468941401
Is Lava Shawarma clean?
Lava Shawarma is currently Grade B from NYC Department of Health and Mental Hygiene (DOHMH), from an inspection on October 7, 2025. Inspectors wrote up 3 critical violations — the kind most directly linked to foodborne illness. On Cooked's ladder that reads mid 😬.
What did inspectors find at Lava Shawarma?
These are the violations recorded at the most recent inspection on October 7, 2025, in plain English, with the city's own wording underneath.
- 🍽️food left out / unprotectedcriticalFood, supplies, or equipment not protected from potential source of contamination during storage, preparation, transportation, display, service or from customer’s refillable, reusable container. Condiments not in single-service containers or dispensed directly by the vendor.
- 🪰flies in the housecriticalFilth flies or food/refuse/sewage associated with (FRSA) flies or other nuisance pests in establishment’s food and/or non-food areas. FRSA flies include house flies, blow flies, bottle flies, flesh flies, drain flies, Phorid flies and fruit flies.
- 🕳️basically rolling out the welcome mat for pestsEstablishment is not free of harborage or conditions conducive to rodents, insects or other pests.
- 🛠️surfaces / setup not up to codeNon-food contact surface or equipment made of unacceptable material, not kept clean, or not properly sealed, raised, spaced or movable to allow accessibility for cleaning on all sides, above and underneath the unit.
- 🧽surfaces not properly sanitizedcriticalFood contact surface not properly washed, rinsed and sanitized after each use and following any activity when contamination may have occurred.
When was Lava Shawarma last inspected?
Lava Shawarma has 2 inspections on record going back to August 22, 2025, averaging 35 points.
| date | result | score |
|---|---|---|
| October 7, 2025 | Grade B | 22 pts |
| August 22, 2025 | no grade issued ⏳ | 48 pts |
Lava Shawarma vs West Village
West Village runs 81% clean across 1,012 tracked restaurants — 722 clean, 48 mid, 117 cooked.
Against the 1,012 spots Cooked tracks in West Village, this one comes out cleaner than 15% of them.
Other spots in West Village
How New York grades restaurants
New York City health inspectors score violations in points, and lower is better: 0–13 points earns an A, 14–27 a B, and 28 or more a C. Every restaurant is inspected at least once a year, and the letter has to be posted in the window. A restaurant that scores 14 or more on the first inspection of a cycle does not get a letter right away — it stays “Grade Pending” until a re-inspection settles it, which is why some spots here show an hourglass instead of a letter. Cooked only ever shows a letter the city actually posted; we never infer one from a score.
Source: NYC Department of Health and Mental Hygiene (DOHMH) via NYC Open Data. Cooked refreshes this data daily — this listing's most recent inspection is dated October 7, 2025. Inspection results describe one moment in a kitchen's life, not a permanent verdict.