the cheesecake factory

website: http://www.thecheesecakefactory.com

location: various locations, i visited the walden galleria location in buffalo, new york (walden galleria, cheektowaga, 716-685-2600)

restaurant type: nicer sit down restaurant and dessert place with western food options

price range: $10 - $50 usd

dress code: casual to business casual, jeans and runners are acceptable, suits and uber dressy clothing less likely

ideal for: friends with an occasion or looking for something interesting, dates

worth grins:
- big selection of menu options
- long list of cheesecakes to choose from
- combination platters
- big portions (for a canadian anyways)

worth shaking fists:
- preferred menu items not kept in stock
- "blue rare" steaks are not an option
- long wait times for tables
- poor lighting

my tastes:
i guess i should warn you before you get too far into this review that it is going to be long and full of mixed content. my (first) experience with "the cheesecake factory" was yesterday and it was kind of bittersweet to put it in food context. it was like a roller coaster ride with lots of ups and downs, some more tolerable than others. so i felt the urge to actually write about the whole experience.

the restaurant itself was pretty nice. having opened very recently it was nicely decorated with a warm yet active feel. the high ceiling gave the impression of openness even though the tables were crowded a little closer than ideal. the lively atmosphere of random conversation and various guests made it seem more fun than expected. for some strange reason though the lighting changed a lot near the end of our meal going from a warm orangey lighting to a strangely depressing dimness.

to start the review of my experience eating at "the cheesecake factory", i must say the wait for our table was horrendous. granted it was prime dinner time but to be told "twenty to forty minutes" followed by "here is your pager so we can page you when you get your pager...but you have to stay within the immediate area of the restaurant" is a little ridiculous. i mean, a nice restaurant located in a mall that is smart enough to use a pager system should be smart enough to give it enough range to go to at least the nearby stores. but no, a few of us ended up sitting on a bench outside the restaurant waiting while the rest of the group went and finished their shopping (by that i really mean the boys sat on the bench waiting while the girls went shopping).

once we got our table it was kind of nice. we were shown our table, given our menus, and our server showed up within five minutes asking if we wanted anything to drink. the menu was pleasantly long with lots of options to choose from in a variety of categories (although this did cause the more indecisive individuals to run into some difficulties). i thought the most enjoyable part of the menu (sadly, also the part to disappoint me later on) was the "factory combinations" section. it started when i (finally) narrowed it down to "herb crusted filet of salmon" and "steak diane" when i noticed the "factory combinations" section where there was the item "steak diane and herb crusted salmon" which was exactly what i wanted. unfortunately, when i got back to the table from the restroom i was told by my friends that they were out of steak diane. i was devastated. apparently it is one of their more popular items and they had run out, which to me is a big mistake on the part of the restaurant. how can they not stock up on their more popular items during a well-known long weekend when "foreigners" (aka canadians) are going to be visiting the closest major mall to the border?

sigh, i ended up sharing a "hibachi steak" with a friend. it was quite nice, came pre-cut and laid out on the plate along with our "wasabi mashed potatoes" which i was very hesitant about. see, i really like mashed potatoes and i like wasabi...but i like them separately. i am not really sure if it was a good thing or a bad thing but the "wasabi mashed potatoes" did not taste that much like wasabi. when compared with regular mashed potatoes from someone else's meal i could not noticeably tell the difference between the two. the steak on the other hand was quite nice, cooked to a deep red rare ("blue rare" was not an option apparently), sitting in a small serving of "soy steak sauce" that tasted slightly sweet and a little like teriyaki sauce. the only downside to the steak was the tough cutting involved for some inexplicable reason.

the cheesecake i had was "chocolate oreo mudslide cheesecake" and it is as sweet as the name implies. i was fortunate that the person who i shared the "hibachi steak" with is a light eater and we ended up sharing dessert as well because i would not have finished it otherwise. the cheesecake was thick, heavy, and very sweet (as expected). it was good but had my friends not warned me in advance about how heavy they are, i would have had to pack the whole thing minus maybe one or two bites.

overall, the experience was pretty good. the wait would not have been so bad had our group not been tired from travelling from another country followed by shopping. i would have enjoyed it a whole lot more had my first choice in menu options was available. what i ended up having was really quite good and my original hesitations were not a problem at all. the cheesecake was definitely really good...to the point that i ended up buying the most expensive six-inch cheesecake ever in my life (at around twenty usd) without hesitation.