> Millennials who went to the Cheesecake Factory, especially for special occasions, associate it with good feelings. If the restaurant is where you spent your parents’ anniversary or your own birthday, then it’s going to be tethered to happiness. Under the warm, gauzy filter that nostalgia provides, it’s hard for Cheesecake Factory aficionados, especially ones hardened by adulthoods that were punctuated by various financial crises, the fallout from 9/11, climate change, and a pandemic, not to look back at the restaurant without some kind of wistful sentimentality.
Interestingly, one restaurant that had even more of this nostalgia vibe for me as a kid in the late 80’s, early 90’s was Pizza Hut.
I remember going there for parties and celebrations and having a nice sit down dinner. However, in the late 1990s, it went downmarket to try to compete with Dominos. The sit down experience greatly declined.
Pizza Hut apparently still runs the Book It program, where students earn a free personal pan pizza for meeting a reading goal[1]. There's a lot of nostalgia I have for 90's Pizza Hut in part because of that program. That and the PS1 demo disc they gave out once.
I miss the old Pizza Hut. In some markets overseas, Pizza Hut was positioned as an upscale pizza experience and that isn't too far from what it used to be in the 90s. It was great, but nowadays it's just another random pizza delivery place.
I never saw it as upscale, but I think it was the second big US fast food chain to open in NL, although their pizzas were thick and greasy and not very pizza-like, I liked them a lot more than McD.
Maybe "upscale" isn't indeed the right word for the US experience, but perhaps a "superior" and "more fun" pizza experience? Like, going out to enjoy a pizza with your family, rather than answering the door on jammies to eat pizza delivery. It was well above McDonalds, Subway, Chipotle and other fast food places.
It competed in that way more with Applebees and TGIFridays; A "Casual Dining" or "Family Style" place that happened to serve Pizza as it's main dish, before the trend of "fast casual".
That’s funny. I distinctly remember Pizza Hut as the cheap-ish place where waiters would inexplicably introduce themselves with their first name and make kind of a show out of serving fast food; as a child in Germany, where this isn’t at all customary, I was like; „what the hell? I just want to tell you my order and expect you to bring it to my table once ready, I didn’t ask for your life story!“. Hence, I didn’t like it and tried to steer clear if possible.
Whereas here in Ireland, Pizza Hut has joined forces with Supermac's, an Irish chain which is in the McDonald's/Burger King kind of space. Most (maybe all) are Supermac's/Pizza Hut combined.
Pizza Hut (and papa johns) are sit-down restaurants in Nicaragua. You can even get stuffed crust on personal sized pizzas, which historically is not possible in the US.
Same, there was a "sit down and share" family atmosphere to it. I think the popularity of home delivered pizza killed in the UK, and they became dust chains
> However, in the late 1990s, it went downmarket to try to compete with Dominos.
We had one of the few sit down pizza hut restaurants in NYC and went there a lot with my family. Later on I worked near by and went for the lunch buffet frequently with coworkers. Then the pizza changed at some point and I didn't care for it.
No I crave Tommy's in Gettysburg PA. They still make pizza using the original recipe and same sit-down atmosphere right down to the textured red plastic "glasses".
That's weird, I have zero nostalgia of any food I had as a child.
Around high school I started being interested into any type of food and never looked back afterward.
Cheesecake Factory, similar to Costco, is the ultimate example of how you have to know the rules to break the rules. The entire company is fascinating because they holistically designed an entire system where every single part of it works in concert to deliver their unique experience.
Nobody can really copy them because you can’t do it unless you start from a truly ground up perspective. Others who seem superficially similar on the surface simply can’t deliver a comparable experience because of this.
Is there any good public writing going into detail about this? Lots has been written on how Costco is Costco but all my info on CCF has been from geeking out with insiders who are also passionate about system design.
> Cheesecake Factory, similar to Costco, is the ultimate example of how you have to know the rules to break the rules.
I read the article. It doesn't read like he understood 'the rules' at all.
> Overton told Thrillist in that same interview that he wouldn’t have made the menu so big and expansive if he had known more about the industry and how restaurants are supposed to operate.
I'm surprised anyone enjoys anything besides the cheesecake. I've been to several locations with different people so it's not isolated to me or one restaurant. The pasta sauce is so watered down it doesn't even stick to the pasta. Their food is mediocore at best.
I think that's part of the point. They don't focus on mastering a handful of dishes so they don't have the best of anything. At the same time they make an acceptable version of a wide variety of dishes. They are a great option if you're in a group that can't agree on what kind of food to get because almost anyone can find something they'll be okay with on the 20 page menu.
I think their cheesecake is mediocre at best as well. But then, I have no nostalgic or warm feelings about The Cheesecake Factory. It's just a chain restaurant, with everything that comes with that. I don't avoid the place. It's mediocre, not bad, but I'll always look to see if there's a better option around.
My big letdown was the cheesecake. Pretty average but with lots of different flavor options. Definitely nowhere near dedicated cheesecake bakeries. Also it was expensive
> Cheesecake Factory, similar to Costco, is the ultimate example of how you have to know the rules to break the rules.
I mean, it's a themed casual dining experience along the lines of Rainforest Cafe, Buca di Beppo, Hard Rock Cafe, Bubba Gump Shrimp Co., etc. What "rules" are they breaking?
If you ignore the tiny chain at #1, look at the gap between CCF and their #2 competitor in sales per location. I think at some point I read that CCF was second only to Apple Store in revenue per square foot (I think in prime real estate corridors, excluding luxury or some similar criteria, it was a while ago).
Edit: first watch this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=myRFzVmH1tg . Best way to analogize it is that CCF is the Katie Ledecky of casual chain restaurants. Because people who write about business and tech don’t really go to casual chain restaurants, nobody appreciates their accomplishments like they do Costco or In-n-Out.
Personally I’m not sure I’ve ever eaten in one. I like a good fast casual burger now and then it’s often a good choice late night or at an airport. Sometimes I’ll break down and eat at some casual chain at an airport or in some suburban location. But if there’s a location with a CCF there are probably other options I’m inclined to choose first.
The reason why everyone sleeps on the Cheesecake Factory is very simple. The problem CCF solves is simply never encountered by the upper middle class because entry into this stratum is socially coded by having an adventurous palate where outwardly acting like a picky eater is a mark of shame.
Thus, CCF is viewed as a class shibboleth because the problem CCF solves extremely well is getting together a group of people with lots of picky eaters who are all different kinds of picky eaters but who all still want good food and you have to pick a place you can all go. You're simply never expected to run into this problem if you run in upper middle class circles but it's a nightmare scenario for everyone else in cities without a CCF and having a CCF in your city solves it in a way that is a meaningful upgrade in your quality of life.
As a result, people vastly underestimate the difficulty of this problem and how poor CCF's competitors are compared to it and how much brand loyalty people who don't have this social coding have towards this company for perfectly logical reasons.
CCF's great accomplishment is not just realizing this but then designing their entire restaurant from the ground up to totally holistically solve this very hard problem and their near monopoly level profits are a reward for their hard work.
Sure—I'm not totally convinced by the class analysis but the big menu is definitely a reason to go. In a lot of cities, diners, especially Greek-owned diners, traditionally filled this role of restaurant with a menu the proverbial size of a phone book, but they're fewer in number and their menus have often shrank.
The "high-low" aesthetic the article mentions is important, too, I think. You can go there in a lot of contexts and it doesn't feel weird, because it isn't any normal genre of restaurant you have associations with, nor does it have a hokey theme. Teenagers can go, families can go, couples can go, coworkers can go. People go for dessert, people go for takeout, people go for drinks and appetizers.
fascinating comparison! can wholeheartedly confirm! A close friend was a super picky eater, and he'd order the same safe things while it allowed "adventurous" (for the 1980s) eaters to sample greek and italian foods not found at strictly-American places like Friendly's.
The problem with chain restaurants is that the more they offer the more likely it's pre-prepared frozen/canned food that they just reheated or dropped in a fryer.
I set out to try a wide variety of local 'mom and pop' pizza restaurants and I quickly realized that all of them used the same supplier. In fact most of them even use the same sauce recipe.
I understand why people won’t be happy about what you are saying, but what you saying grabs at the essential nature of their success.
I don’t think it’s an “upper middle” thing but it is the class thing. It’s the default. The mass produced essential corner store or bar. And anyone can be seen there, and the food is customizable and nobody ever gets embarrassed or loses face for picking the place and the service is consistent.
It is the quintessential Hydreuma — for every thirsty Roman.
It's impressive the contortions people go to try to shame other for enjoying decent food at a decent price, and not obsessed with proving they are cool. Luckily, we're busy enjoying our food, family, and friends.
This is a novel insight that the article doesn’t touch on.
It’s absolutely a class indicator. You could order a steak well done at The Factory and you’d fit right in. It fits in with people who have a concept of “fine dining”, which they may not go to much but understand what it means. In other circles in big cities, fine dining is equally rare but spending $75-150/pp at a “casual” (meaning no tablecloth) restaurant is normal. $100 for casual dining is the exact opposite of what The Factory is about.
This is exactly what people were really talking about a few years ago on Reddit with the post about being in New York, but then eating at the Times Square Olive Garden.
Only a few blocks away is Bryant Park Grill. Prices at the two restaurants are surprisingly similar and both have over 500 seats. However, different people will enjoy their meal, or be uncomfortable or even offended at either one.
It could also explain why Yelp restaurant reviews are so baffling. They need to figure out how to cluster reviewers by what “language” they’re actually speaking on restaurants.
It’s one reason the old Zagat’s was so useful as the original crowd-sourced reviews. No one but foodies would fill out their (paper) questionnaires so the guides were correspondingly on target for other foodies.
> the upper middle class because entry into this stratum is socially coded by having an adventurous palate where outwardly acting like a picky eater is a mark of shame.
This is changing or has already changed. People in the upper middle class love to exclude certain basic food groups like meat, milk, bread etc. as a projection of their identity.
I find myself agreeing with the class part of your analysis, but think there are other options they fill this niche…
Outback Steakhouse,
The local diner (more so if family owned),
Applebees and TGIF.
Is CCF viewed as higher quality/status than these? I occasionally eat at Outback but not the others, partly location, partly because I find CCF overpriced for very mediocre food.
Applebee’s has long been criticized on the Internet for having food that is pre-made offsite and heated on-premise – something this article swears is common among chains but which CCF does not do. Yeah, the CCF dining room decor and packed waiting room convey a quite different status than your more pub-like “neighborhood” Applebee’s and TGIF’s, or your typically humble diner.
Saddly most "local diners" are now buying premade food from offsite and heating it. It is all the same premade food too, the only difference is the order things are on the menu, and what item they call the house special.
I was about to argue this (because I'm bored!), but then I remembered an anecdote. My mother-in-law (typical rural Midwest small town ex-housewife) mentioned to me one day that the rolls that I made were delicious.
I was a bit confused because I hadn't made any rolls. I had baked a couple loaves of bread though. Didn't think much of it until an hour later I went into the kitchen and thought, "why the hell is the top of this loaf all picked at?"
Then I recalled the comment. I had made challah, a braided Jewish bread. She had never seen braided bread before and thought the braids were rolls all smushed together.
Interesting. I would have assumed CCF prepped food similarly to the other “cheap” chains.
But, I’m not the target audience. I’ll pick a local ethnic place over a chain almost every time. And only use chains when forced by co-workers who won’t deviate from a generic “American” menu.
I fully agree with your points. I’m not sure if it’s class or general inclination to travel etc. but I’m imagining if I went out with friends and peers at a conference, say, the horror at the idea people would have of going to a chain, including CCF, rather than some locally appropriate restaurant—even if a local chain.
But, yeah, most of my friends and people I travel with would think nothing of going to a Chinese restaurant and eating with chopsticks.
Not a judgement and we’d probably have a perfectly good time and dinner at a CCF but it would have pretty much a zero chance of happening.
I do find it interesting though how many people this simple observation seems to upset.
Because chain restaurants are generally kinda gross.
The typical American chain restaurant is going to serve you something that starts with low-quality ingredients, then gets a bunch of sugar, corn syrup, seed oil, artificial food coloring, emulsifiers etc added to it until it roughly approximates the flavor, texture and color of higher-quality ingredients (at the cost of being unhealthy). Then it has various chemicals added to it to act as preservatives or maintain texture or appearance during shipping and storage and re-heating. Then it's packaged into cheap single-use plastic bags or containers that slowly leach endocrine disrupting chemicals into the food, or rapidly leach them during reheating in a microwave.
The end result is that you get something that is edible, but probably kinda gross tasting unless your palette gets used to packaged foods and fast foods, and which is going to make you fat, depressed, distracted and tired.
There's a reason America has an obesity epidemic, diabetes epidemic, falling fertility rates and widespread prescriptions of drugs for depression, anxiety, adhd, etc, and it's the food the average American is eating.
The "horror" is less about going to the chain restaurant, and more the derision you'd face from your peers at suggesting it. The logic goes "If you like shitty chain food, it's because you don't have good points of reference to compare against, because you haven't experienced a wide variety of cuisine, because you're poor".
The “horror” is that you will only live to eat a fixed number of meals, so why on Earth would you waste one of your “meal slots” eating food at a chain that’s no better than reheated leftovers in your fridge?
Are you asking that question unironically? Why a lunch spent with your colleagues at CCF might be worth considering over the refrigerated leftovers waiting in the break room?
For me, it's like you suggest - more disinterest than horror. But it happens regularly with out-of-town coworkers. There are lots of above average ethnic places near my home and office (same 'hood). But, in a large enough group, there's usually one or two meat-n-potatoes person who doesn't want to try anything new.
> And only use chains when forced by co-workers who won’t deviate from a generic “American” menu.
Completely tangential, but a local Korean place (Haru K-BBQ) has fried chicken as one of the “Western” items. However, the fried chicken itself is a reason to go because they do such a nice take on this item.
There's an Indian fried chicken fusion type thing called pepper chicken that I think is eventually going to take the country by storm
I honestly think that some fusion fried chicken joint might be the next Chipotle type hit. Indian Korean Japanese Chinese Mexican styles of fried chicken all under one house
Yea, I've always associated Cheesecake Factory with every other generic chain restaurant--exactly like Applebee's, TGIFridays, Outback, Olive Garden, and so on. It's a place you take large groups that contain picky eaters.
If you are lucky enough to have quality local ethnic places and have no particular love for mainstream American food, fine. Many towns in America can't do much better than a Chinese buffet, though, for which American chain restaurants are competitive alternatives.
I would like to buy the same pre made meals and heat it up at my home, at a reduced cost. The quality isn't bad, I'd even say "good" in some cases and my kids like the chicken tenders. Kind of a Papa Murphy's take and bake casual dining thing. Does this exist?
I don't know if they have a reach outside the upper Midwest, but that seems to describe Schwan's. They have a wide variety of premade foods ready for reheating or cooking (e.g., cheesy potato puffs). Haven't gotten food from them in a while, but I remember it being pretty good. At least, far better than supermarket frozen meals. I've actually been known to follow a Schwan's truck until it stopped so I could buy on the spot :-)
They typically have a number of households on a weekly rotation and deliver in temperature controlled trucks. You can buy food when they show up at your house or if you're well-organized, preorder.
They probably also ship.
Ignore the "salmonella vanilla" remarks: that was a long time ago :-)
Most cities have a few local places that do similar things - mine certainly does. Some are dedicated take-home places, others are restaurants that also package prepared meals during their slow hours. The locals always know about the good ones. You'll find the majority of these places/meals are pasta, largely because pasta stores easily and reheats consistently.
As for chains, Maggiano's used to do an eat-one-take-one deal, where for a $5-10 add-on you could get a pre-chilled pasta dish to take home, but I'm not sure they still do. That deal was great for takeout. A hot meal for tonight, leftovers for tomorrow, throw the chilled one in the freezer.
I don’t know but I would assume the big food service providers don’t have some special “secret sauce” versus what you can buy in the freezer cases of the supermarket and at least assemble pretty quickly.
I’ve also definitely found frozen stuff I can order like soft shell crab and soup dumplings that make super easy meals.
I don’t know about meals but several popular restaurants chains offer branded food in the grocer’s freezer. From what I’ve seen they are mostly appetizers but there are also some entrees and desserts.
Applebees and TGIF also try to market themselves as the respectable neighborhood bar for suburban areas that don't otherwise have one; they're a little more casual and the food isn't as much the center of attention as it is at CCF.
I wish people would say why they are downvoting you. Because, in my experience, you are right on. I assume the downvoters disagree, but, why do they disagree?
I didn't vote, but I find myself a little confused. I suspect the whole "upper middle class" bit has to be a regional thing; it simply doesn't fit my experiences at all. Around where I live, there's certainly no stigma at all about being a picky eater, or at least not one that's in any way specific to a social class. Plenty of people have preferences, and there's no shortage of places to go that offer genetic (casual or fine) dining that everyone will accept.
Do you know any adults who will literally only eat chicken tenders or a cheeseburger at restaurants, thus Thai/Vietnamese/Indian/new hip joint, etc. are not going to work?
I would observe that there’s a reason steakhouses are often a standard for customer dinners. They’re also usually at least so-so fish and vegetable options but nothing is too adventurous and they’re considered a safe upscale choice.
Class distinction is a second order effect and isn’t really the topic being discussed. The primary mover is pickiness, which does generally track with class.
A mostly disappointing meal for everyone involved. If you know someone is picky ahead of time the meal can be steered towards a place that's accommodating. If, however, everyone is surprised by the picky eater then you're left with some disappointing choices. You either ruin everyone's expectations by changing to a different restaurant at the last minute, or you watch the picky eater try to make the best of what they probably consider a bad situation. Maybe they try something new and hope they like it, but most likely they order the blandest thing they can and everyone gets to feel a little bad about the person ordering a bowl of plain noodles for dinner so they can all eat at the place they planned on/wanted to.
And of course, people don't want to spend time with people who make them feel bad, so the picky eater will gradually be pushed to the fringe, and left out of plans.
I’m not sure if I’d use the term but if someone in a group is constantly high maintenance with respect to food, both the group and they themselves probably lose interest in paddling against the current.
It’s not even really pickiness per se. If some group always wants to just eat fast food I’m going to be less inclined to join them. No value judgement. Just not my thing.
If one's position and circle is below the class threshold that cares for these things, such a stigma would be invisible - it just wouldn't be a thing that they'd have seen in their lived experience.
And, here's the hook to what you say regarding it being a regional thing: this class distinctions are also applied at the regional level. E.g. whole states can be considered "lower social class" (regardless if they have millionaires or well off upper middle class people and so on).
In "high class" states or circles within a state, though, the stigma would a quite real thing (even if it's just an inconsequental matter, as seen from outside).
It's not about wealth levels either, as class concerns are just as high in stressed-to-appear-appropriately-high-class aspiring classes, that make less than what a developer does, but their circles are all about class distinctions and their shibboleths. The stereotypical "New Yorker" reader would be a total weirdo about such matters, even more stressed and awkward about following all the BS rules than people actually belonging to the 0.1%.
But even if you are a billionaire, you can be the low-class butt of the joke to "old money" types.
(That's my understanding of the US class system on this matter - there are some quite good books about it, "Class" by Paul Fussell is quite good. It's also a subject that certain kinds of literature and journalism wont shut up about).
This seems accurate to me. I've lived in the Bay Area and currently live in the southeast and have noticed that those who are very wealthy in the southeast don't seem to have the same interests in style, food, or fashion as those with equivalent wealth in the Bay Area (not saying one way is right or wrong). For the wealthy in the southeast, houses tend to be larger but constructed in mostly the same way as regular houses rather than having different architectural styles. Like housing, food tends to be "the same but nicer" instead of more exotic, e.g., a Ruth's Chris rather a Galician steakhouse.
Related side story: when I lived near SF, I saw in the news that the lone Olive Garden in the city (in Stonestown Galleria) was going to close. I asked out loud "Who on earth eats at the Olive Garden in San Francisco when there are so many other options for authentic Italian?" My wife, who was sitting next to me, got a sheepish look on her face. It turns out she drove into the city all the time specifically to go to that Olive Garden. She said it reminded her of home and she liked the nostalgia of it haha
> this class distinctions are also applied at the regional level.
Living in Hawai'i it would strike me how popular CCF was for people that came all that way (typically middle class Americans) and have access to tons of great variety in ethnic places they may not at home, along with local joints that would serve familiar food with the option of local flavour. But some of these comments put it in good context, that it is the familiar and safe choice and has a special or semi-fancy vibe to a large subset of those people.
I don't think I've eaten in one since I was a preteen and may have only been once, but come to think of it, at the time I grew up rural 45 minutes to the nearest small city, eating at cheesecake factory did seem like a special occasion.
I find this obsession with the "class" of restaurants in the US comical.
Nobody gives a fuck if you go and eat in a "middling" establishment equivalent to CCF in these here parts, even if you're old money. And nobody cares of most other US shibboleths of class.
Whereas in the US it's as if something like CCF or, god forbid, Olive Garden, has leprosy, for some types of "high class" or wanabee so, people.
I'm not sure where you live, but I'm going to guess you are someplace where most restaurants have not discovered they can fire the chefs, buy factory produced food and reheat it with cheap labor. There is a massive quality difference, and so people who like good food will not eat in some places.
When I go to Europe or Asia, I have high confidence I can walk into a random restaurant/cafe and get good food made with high quality fresh ingredients on sight. Of course not every restaurant/cafe is good, but enough are.
>I'm not sure where you live, but I'm going to guess you are someplace where most restaurants have not discovered they can fire the chefs, buy factory produced food and reheat it with cheap labor. There is a massive quality difference, and so people who like good food will not eat in some places.
Europe. I've tried such american restaurants like CCF, and they're not just "reheated factory produced food". Even Olive Garden isn't that (the prepare stuff on-site, contrary to myth). In fact, they're better than many local ones.
I'd say it's less about liking good food than liking to signal class status. The same people have no issue eating shoddily made chinese take-away or in-and-out or total prepackaged factory crap sold in their upclass super market, because those are not associated with a class stigma.
It occurred to me, perhaps a difference is that price point of restaurant isn't full of megachains in Europe? In the land of cookie-cutter strip malls, buying into heavily corporatised consumerism in the presence of more 'authentic' options is responsible for part of the stigma of such places.
In Australia at least where there are some chains for casual/fast food but not so much for restaurants, I haven't sensed this stigma because that dining niche is occupied by the local hotel's restaurant or a pub with low to no pretenses but a decent to quite good meal.
>buying into heavily corporatised consumerism in the presence of more 'authentic' options is responsible for part of the stigma of such places
I'm not sure it's that, since 99% of the consumption of those same snobs are heavily corporatised consumerism. It's just the expensive kind marketed to more affluent suckers. They're for example OK with Starbucks, the kind of "heavily corporatised consumerism", and all kind of BS upscale consumerist brands like Lululemon.
Class matters most to those on the precipice of their class distinction. If you're old-money, and your entire social circle is old-money, then you don't view the things you do as being "high class", they're just normal things you do. So it goes with the middle and low classes.
You see the most obsession with class concerns in areas where you have people who are class mobile: There's a lot of nouveau riche and upper-middle class people in tech, because tech has been a massive boom industry. Likewise you see a fair amount of class concern among people falling down the social ladder, such as the generations that grew up within environment of an old-money fortune, but for whatever reason that money was lost.
That's the thing, the person that first responded to me mentioned that money didn't matter, class was an attitude that only certain people in certain areas have.
I feel like everyone is talking in circles just wanting to be right on the internet.
As someone obsessed with Hawaiian food (lived in Vegas most of my life), I just wanted to hit all the local places when I visited. We did eat at Roy’s steakhouse though.
Well, it is the ninth island and all :) never been to a location on the mainland, wiki seems to suggest most were not under original ownership, actually were owned by Bloomin Brands for a while who runs several of the concept megachains that would be in TCF's class, so those may not make my arbitrary cut.
This seems correct. Buffett lives in Omaha (where he is part of the upper class) and eats basically only McDonald's, steak and canned soda. In NY and LA among middle-class circles a 10-year-old child with these eating habits would be pitied for his parents' failure to educate him correctly.
I guess I'm low-class, but it must be exhausting to even see any of this, let alone care about it or worry about which shibboleths I happen to be showing.
Cheesecake Factory is actually pretty good, though. My go-to is the spicy cashew chicken, which is really tasty, and big enough that I always take some home.
A tip if you ever do go: When the bread arrives, eschew the butter and ask for a side of ranch dressing to dip the bread in. It sounds weird (I don’t even like ranch normally) and everybody I’ve ever told about it looks at me skeptically, but once they try it they instantly become a convert.
I’ve eaten at Cheesecake Factory a couple of times but it always feels so heavy to me. I’d rather pay the higher prices at Din Tai Feng and get more manageable portions.
Two things: a) it's Din Tai Fung; and b) nobody who's aiming for The Cheesecake Factory across the street from the convention center is going to accidentally wind up at the Pacific Place (or, worse, UVillage) Din Tai Fung.
They are completely different menus and dining experiences. Though if The Cheesecake Factory ever adds soup dumplings to their menu, I bet they will be pretty good and cheaper.
I learned mandarin in the mainland so the romanization of 鼎泰丰 stuck in my head is different. Also, I was thinking more Bellevue square, where Din Tai Fung is fairly located across the street, so it’s actually a choice to make (though getting a seat at cheese cake factory is usually easier). I would put them up as comparable: they are both chains, they are both kind of pricey for chains, and if I were in Beijing, it would be a legitimate question to think about going to that or a western food chain.
It is expensive. It Bellevue at least, there are other options (Topgun for example) but requiring driving, and you are still spending $80 or so. DTF is ok once in awhile, it’s not like there are tons of other Taiwanese dim sum places, most of them are going to be Cantonese.
They make almost everything (baked desserts and cheesecake excepted) in house. Most casual dining places use a lot of Sysco pre-made stuff. This doesn't make it better but that's unusual for a chain, along with the high number of menu items.
The article mentions they have separate bakeries (uncertain whether Cheesecake Factory owned or not), the in house kitchen/pantry/freezer is optimized around food prep/cooking everything else on menu.
And yet, I drive by there every morning on my way to work, and twice a week there's a Sysco truck backing in to their parking lot. What exactly are they delivering, if not pre-made.
If I wanted to spend $150 eating out, I'd want something slightly less nasty than their crap. It tastes like microwaved Stouffers.
Rather than them being supergenius restauranteurs, it really does look like they just managed to survive the last decade when so many other chain restaurants went tits up since 2008. That coupled with covid cabin fever that seems like it never went away, makes for the sort of busy some mistake for grand success.
Sysco delivers food, no more, no less. They deliver what is ordered. If you ordered canned breakfast gravy, that's what arrives. If you order fresh produce, you get what you asked for. Now I'm not saying there are not better sources for top quality fresh ingredients out there. But it's also not accurate to equate Sysco with strictly premade garbage.
Sysco can also act as a logistics service for your own supplies if you are big enough. I used to work for a large restaurant chain (large enough that we would negotiate shrimp prices by the ton). We would have our beef suppliers deliver to Sysco cold storage, and then individual locations would order from there. We owned the beef the whole time, and just paid for storage and delivery.
It would surprise me if CCF isn’t doing this with some of their ingredients.
CCF is probably using their logistics to ship their cheesecakes from their factory in California nationwide, at the very least. That's something that has to get distributed nationwide and there are no easy replacements.
I worked on the system sysco uses for their order guide management, and we had a bug that let anyone order cheesecake factory cheesecakes for a brief moment and that was a red alert issue for us
sysco also delivers ingredients, they're not the best quality, but I was at a place where everything was from scratch and most of the produce and ingredients came from sysco.
Yeah, and for produce honestly they were just fine, on par with what you'd get at the local HEB. I wasn't impressed by the meat quality but our manager might have been getting the cheaper stuff from them.
Much of what they cook is pasta. Are the ingredients "dried pasta"? Are they cooking the sauces themselves, after stewing tomatoes for 6 hours? Or do those come out of a can?
I'm guessing that for the pasta, they're boiling water. The rest of their menu looks like cheeseburgers and sandwiches. So maybe they're frying up a frozen patty once in awhile. Are they baking the bread and buns for these sandwiches themselves?
They also have alot of weird appetizers. Are they wrapping those spring rolls themselves, or do those come frozen out of a box and ready to deep fry? Fried cheese sticks, asparagus, and zucchini... are you telling me those are hand-breaded, or do they come frozen out of a box?
(Before you answer, consider carefully if someone who has never wrapped a spring roll before can get it right on even the 10th try after watching a 40 second tutorial video on the ipad they have bolted up above the prep table.)
There are half a dozen soups. Are those not coming out of a can?
Crusted/breaded chicken... that's not coming out of the box frozen?
Oh, looks like you can get onion rings. Are those not coming frozen out of the box to be deep-fried? French fries?
When I get the crispy pineapple chicken and shrimp, are you telling me that they cut up a pineapple that morning for when that's ordered, or do they cut up the pineapple when I order it? Or, is it frozen in a plastic bag, like those god-awful stir-fries you get in the frozen section at the grocery store?
Did they slice the corn off the cob that morning themselves, or does that come out of a plastic bag, all flash-frozen?
Do they have a rice steamer in the back, or is that in one of those plastic per-serving bags that are microwaved?
The only stuff on this menu that are both "made themselves" and "not fast food" are the steaks (and good luck getting a good one there).
This place shares its menu (literally) with Fazolis. There are CCF-branded items on Fazolis menu the last time I went there. This is TGI Friday's level bullshit. They aren't some big-data driven Nostradamuses (Nostradami?), the link's just a gussed-up press release.
I was able to roll spring rolls pretty well in around 10 minutes of practice, although the prep area required might be difficult for a chain restaurant.
I don't really eat at the cheesecake factory so I can't speak to that.
Any one of those are things they might do, quickly and easily and with little practice. All of them, or even half?
They're not doing them. Any of them. If someone made such extraordinary claims, reasonable people would require extraordinary evidence.
I've provided quite a bit of corroboration to the idea that they're not doing any of it. Sure, my case is circumstantial, but I think that's permissible outside of a criminal courtroom, where the accusation is "non-crime, doing it like everyone else" without so much as the hint of slander.
You're all nuts. Nothing said on HN outside of a very narrow focus of technology should ever be taken for granted.
It is ridiculous. Excluding drinks, you can eat for $25 per person at a casual restaurant even on the US west coast. But pre Covid, I would say that may have been $15 to $20.
If you are getting an appetizer, dinner, and dessert, then add another $20 to $30, but very, very few people should be eating that many calories and sugar/sat fats.
Not for casual, though I guess it depends on where you live.
Assuming you don't order alcohol, and avoid specialty foods (lobster in the Midwest, proper steak pretty much anywhere) it shouldn't be hard to get a meal for two under $50 in most casual places. If I'm willing to spend more than that, we're going straight to fine dining
right but it's still not crazy like $150 for 1 person. I spend around $200 a month for one person, so it's not like I'm not cheap :) . I almost never eat out except special occasions like a birthday or the holidays.
I'd also like to know. It seems like a lot of restaurants like BJ's Brewhouse which has a menu longer than a dictionary (exaggerating of course, but it's ridiculous). Of course nothing is THAT great.
In short, it's about making an experience that draws people in who are looking for the comfort/familiarity/ease of a chain, while not just relying on that. The Cheesecake Factory is an above-average restaurant masquerading as a Sysco-food-reheating-service.
The very large menu is a feature--something for everyone--that would be a bug if a lot of other restaurants tried it because the execution is often so dismal once a particular level of size or growth (or both) is reached.
"Something for everyone" is stretching it when they have one vegan entree: The Impossible Burger. The closest second option, if it even counts as a separate option, is the "Skinny" Impossible Burger, which comes with mayo that can be removed.
Nothing else is close to vegan, unless you're into ordering Chicken Lettuce Wraps without Chicken.
True Vegan (no Honey etc) is unusually strict but “there are 9 vegan options at the Cheesecake Factory, plus a handful of other dishes that can be customized to make it vegan.” https://dietmenus.com/restaurant/the-cheesecake-factory
There are a few more options when generalizing beyond entrées, but still five of the items listed on that page are salads, with the other four being a side of beets, asparagus, artichoke, or edamame. Which, at double digit Calories, is only as much a reasonable meal for vegans as it is for carnists (that is to say not much of one).
A lot of vegetarians and vegans I know personally hate salad, because it is so often the only option at a restaurant and often an afterthought for those who don’t eat meat or are trying to lose weight.
It also does limit the choice of dressing, for example anything with mayo is off limits.
> Nothing else is close to vegan, unless you're into ordering Chicken Lettuce Wraps without Chicken.
They just haven't figured out how to keep vegans from spoiling in a commercial kitchen yet. They're high maintenance, a bit too big for the freezer, and the vacuum packer tends to deprive them of oxygen.
By that notion my home kitchen also has something for everyone because I have a tomato in the fridge. Where's my HN praise for being so culinarily flexible?
The avocado lettuce wraps are really good (I'm mostly vegan). I've taken my young kids (6 and 4) there and it works out great. I usually get this and the kids get whatever they want.
I'm allergic to milk and I stay very far away from such places. Cross-contamination is pretty much a given. (Same with actual fancy restaurants and butter.)
Thank you for that video. I would have assumed TCF was a Sysco-food-reheating-service masquerading as a slightly expensive mid-range restaurant. I have a new respect for it, though don't understand how they present themselves.
> Proteins, sauces, veggies, the dressings that go in their gigantic salads, the chicken marsala and mushrooms — it’s cooked on the spot. If there’s any part of the Cheesecake Factory that resembles an industrial machine, it’s the multiple stations and line cooks needed to create handmade food for every meal. ...
> “Their quality, their execution, and consistency across the country — it is always the same. And that’s a compliment! That’s impeccable,” pastry chef and Food Network star Young says, “The sauces, the dressings, everything is made in-house. That level of consistency doesn’t happen anywhere else.”
This is in the last section, titled "The Cheesecake Factory is a marvel." That section is the most interesting part, because it talks about the execution required to make a large amount of a wide variety of food from scratch, at scale, consistently.
The bigger your throughput is the less food gets wasted because the variance of food needed for a day decreases. One restaurant with a big menu would be more efficient than two smaller restaurants with smaller menu.
The big rule they break is that they have a gigantic menu. Its the actual antithesis of what gordon ramsey tries to teach restaurant owners over and over in his show Kitchen Nightmares.
What will also be interesting imo is seeing what CCF looks like in another 20 years after we've (maybe) gone through another recession. Will they cut back the menu to save labor costs from needing so many people who can cook wildly different dishes at the same time? Smaller restaurants with less kitchen space? More centralization of food prep that is then shipped into an individual location flash frozen?
Businesses that try to expand too much (in all senses of the idea) will face scaling issues and potentially need to cut scope to increase efficiency and lower costs, or be forced to raise prices to compensate. CCF has been around for 45 years according to Wikipedia and has only gotten bigger and more complex at the individual store level. For a restaurant, that is an incredible feat and deserves a lot of analysis that can hopefully be shared with smaller chains or owner-operators to help them find profitability with their existing "small" menus.
Cheesecake factory is probably maxed out in terms of expansion. They are only found in the one or two sides of a city that has residents with higher incomes, in or near the mall with the Apple Store and Nordstroms.
Their market cap has not gone anywhere in 10+ years and they earn meager profit margins, so I assume people whose job it is to analyze the businesses have mostly predicted there is not much room for expansion.
I had never thought about it much and I don’t routinely eat out locally but the one location I could identify off the top of my head, it’s because I sometimes go to the Apple Store in the mall.
I would bet that 20 years from people will lament how Cheesecake Factory used to be good but quality has declined. The fact of the matter is CF is swimming upstream against fast-changing tastes and habits... more takeout/delivery and less dine-in, more preference for small, local, ethnic, fast. Read the comments in this thread -- "hate to admit it", "depressing", "overindulgent", "haven't been to one in years" -- the entire idea of enjoying a large meal at an American chain restaurant is hugely out-of-fashion.
But just still being around in 20 years would be a huge accomplishment (which I think it will achieve). I could roll off a dozen sit-down chain restaurants that were pretty damn popular not very long ago that are dead or on their last legs. TGIFriday, Tony Roma, Marie Callendar, Houlihans, Macaroni Grill, Claim Jumper...
The family dining / lower causal dining market segment (relatively cheap sit-down restaurant, with a waiter) is being squeezed pretty aggressively. The fast-casual segment (order at the counter, but not fast food) was already growing before the pandemic, and those were much better suited to pivoting to take-out and delivery when COVID hit.
As a whole, Americans are demonstrating that they care more about the food quality than the service at a restaurant, by eating at restaurants that, holding price approximately equal, sacrifice service in exchange for better food, rather than eating at family-dining establishments that do the opposite.
> people will lament how Cheesecake Factory used to be good but quality has declined.
I'm also making that prediction. Restaurants are especially susceptible to enshittification. I remember when I worked at Ruby Tuesday in the 90's, it was upscale enough that all servers wore a shirt and tie. They were big on polished brass and wood interior, coupled with above-average food made mostly fresh. These days, it's a glorified Burger King with a salad bar.
The one near me has an Egyptian theme. The main room is a hypostyle hall, lotus columns and everything. It’s a bit like visiting Luxor, only, the holy of holies would be where the bathrooms are.
I imagine it would be the same situation. I am not sure what the purpose of this presentation was anyway, Costco was never in any danger from Amazon. They are in two completely different markets.
The cost of energy and labor to deliver big, heavy goods to an individual's house is obviously more than the cost for individuals to go to a giant store and get it themselves.
If Amazon had opened a store like Costco selling bulk goods, then it might have made sense.
The most surprising thing about that was how big an online retailer Apple is. I never quite realized that their standardized phones and computers mean I have never bought one in a store, not in the last 20 years …
If Costco had an Apple computer in the configuration I wanted, I would buy it from Costco because Costco offers 2 year warranties on computers, whereas buying from Apple would only get you 1 year.
Culver's is an example of doing the same thing for fast food. Large menu, breaks all the traditional fast-food rules. But somehow works and people love it.
Have to say I’m a bit surprised to see an article about The Cheesecake Factory on HN. I’ve been there a few times (though it’s been a while), and I never was impressed.
It just seemed like an overpriced, overcrowded version of every other American chain that couldn’t really figure out what it wanted to specialize in [1], so it just offered everything. The “serve everything” food chain seems to be an overcrowded space in the US.
Maybe I’m in the minority, but I never really understood the appeal.
1. Besides cheesecake, but I don’t think that many people really go there for cheesecake. Most people are usually too full for dessert at restaurants like this.
I disagree with this, and I do feel like a lot of the dislike for The Cheesecake Factory is just snobbery, having been guilty of it myself in the past (e.g. the sibling comment "This restaurant and the Elephant bar will forever remind me of her: aggressively middle class with aspirations of upper class experience without really knowing what that is.") That said, I certainly can understand why it's not everyone's cup of tea and why they wouldn't like it.
The one thing I can't understand is the "overpriced" comment. Recently went with a fairly large group and was pretty shocked how low the total price per person was. Granted, a lot of that was because with the famously large portions a few folks shared, but it was still a better value than the vast majority of other places.
> Maybe I'm in the minority, but I never really understood the appeal.
I think one of the theses of the article is that a lot of its success derives from the nostalgia it earned getting associated with "special occasions" for millennials growing up. And the other being that, while nobody may be clambering for any particular dish from the menu, it's a pretty easy inoffensive choice for a group of people who all want different things.
I'm generally with you, but the nostalgia thing seems to fall squarely in the category of "either you get it or you don't"
I went once, with my first "serious" girlfriend, 15+ years ago. It was one of several trendy chain restaurants she insisted we visit as inexperienced high schoolers. This restaurant and the Elephant bar will forever remind me of her: aggressively middle class with aspirations of upper class experience without really knowing what that is. And on one hand, I do understand it. On the other, it felt tacky and desperate at the time, and I can't really ever shake that association for either place.
I haven't been often, but I feel like I always saw a lot of orders for cheesecake. Many of them were to go orders, both by people eating there and people just going for cheesecake.
It's a cheesecake. They're stored chilled or frozen all the time in a normal bakery too. Freezing makes the most sense for a product that needs to make it from the store to your house without compromising quality. If it's simply chilled, it could start to make a mess before you get home.
Your statement isn't indicative of anything in regards to quality of the product.
That’s why the nostalgia explanation in the article makes a lot of sense. I did not grow up eating Cheesecake Factory, and so when I went there for the first time as an adult, the food was pretty unimpressive.
I don’t know much about it but the fawning over a chain restaurant in this thread really took me by surprise. For some people it seems like nostalgia but others really seem to love it.
10 years ago I (living in the USA) worked with some Europeans who were fans of American sitcoms. We were in my car once and drove by a cheesecake factory. Their minds were blown that it's a real restaurant and not just something made up by Big Bang Theory and they demanded they we go inside. They loved it, and approached it like an Alien researching a new planet
This may still hold up 10 years later: as a European myself (Germany), I actually just learned from this post that the cheesecake factory is a real thing.
I've often said that CF is a quintessentially American restaurant. Like if you had someone visiting from another country and you had to pick one restaurant to demonstrate (celebrate?) the supersized suburban American experience, you could do a lot worse than CF.
The funny thing is in my social circle at least all the people who go to CF are young, extremely highly educated, well-paid immigrants -- For most of these reasons plus hours are predictable, seating is guaranteed, and there is food to satisfy most dietary restrictions. They're probably not assimilated enough to realize CF is declasse lol
Location to location quality is variable. I am very much a big tent, easy-to-please person when it comes to food and the nearest Cheesecake Factory to me has been a big letdown
The way people talk about CF in this thread as if they don't make their food the exact same way, from the exact same suppliers, as other big box chains... well, it shows why places like CF get the free word of mouth and stay in business.
It's interesting what people will do for the sake of feeling "fancy". I have a friend that keeps taking me to the boogiest restaurants for the most mediocre food and I don't enjoy the stuffy ambiance. I don't think he does either, but then he gets to tell people and show the photos and JFC I can't live like that.
Honestly it makes me sad, American "culture" is so ill-defined that... we apparently epitomize showing it off by pointing at our corporate largess. Look our big menu and even bigger microwave! Gross! America actually has a lot of cool stuff, cool sub-cultures, great local food. In non-pretentious settings even. But I guess that depends on why you're going out for dinner...
As much as I hate to say it, the food is good. They have a fully staffed kitchen at every restaurant and cook quite a bit on-site it appears. Their menu which is notorious for being huge also appears smartly designed with many dishes sharing ingredients and technique.
Their burger is actually really good.
My gripe is the portion sizes are just too big. So much waste. I wish I could order half portions at 3/4 the cost.
Why do you hate to say it? I'll admit, I loved Cheesecake Factory as a kid, but then as an adult I feel bad to say I was afflicted by a bit of the "anti-Cheesecake Factory snobbery": it was too kitschy, too "chain theme restaurant", too "American excess" with its giant portions and million menu items. I hadn't been in years (there is also not one close to where I live).
I then went recently as part of a family get together, and it was just plain great. My meal was really, really good: well seasoned, not overly salted/cheesy/creamy but still delicious, the veggies were crisp and fresh. Service was fantastic and prices were great.
In terms of the portion sizes, go for their "skinny" or whatever they call it menu. I had a shrimp pasta dish - it didn't taste like it was "light" or "diet" at all, but primarily the portion size was just much more reasonable. If you do get one of their giant dishes, lots of them, especially their Italian dishes, make for great leftovers.
I think you answer your own question with this bit:
> I'll admit, I loved Cheesecake Factory as a kid, but then as an adult I feel bad to say I was afflicted by a bit of the "anti-Cheesecake Factory snobbery": it was too kitschy, too "chain theme restaurant", too "American excess" with its giant portions and million menu items. I hadn't been in years (there is also not one close to where I live).
A lot of my friends and coworkers have the same view. If it is a chain, it is most likely bad (which is a statement that has a decent chance of being correct) but then extends to "and people who like to eat at chains are bad eaters."
My experience with The Cheesecake Factory is like yours:
> I then went recently as part of a family get together, and it was just plain great. My meal was really, really good: well seasoned, not overly salted/cheesy/creamy but still delicious, the veggies were crisp and fresh.
It's really good food. My wife and I eat there a couple of times a month for "fancy dinner". I feel like so many independently owned restaurants go overboard in either their "conceit", trying to find a way to stand out that winds up being over the top and puffery, or they are aiming for an experimental/possibly-outlandish food menu that winds up falling flat. So many of these places feel like "celebrity chef wannabe outlet that sells a ton of alcohol to make up the profits."
Meanwhile, The Cheesecake Factory merely...exists. Doing its thing, pretty well, with enough variety that it doesn't get boring.
I agree with what you say but I try to not make value judgements about people based on what or where they eat.
One time back in the day I was dating a girl and she somehow got gift certificates to eat at a place called “Golden Corral” which is a buffet. It was not the kind of place I’d considered eating at.
We get in and are sort of shocked at the place - you go through a literal corral after paying and they give you a massive cup for soda. There’s food everywhere and the place is anarchy. But the food was, to my taste, terrible and made from cheap, processed ingredients (too much salt, sugar in everything, fats were cheap oils, select grade meat, etc) and just bad. And the people there seemed to love it. So we had a laugh about the place and food and people that ate there.
But it occurred to me that those people worked hard to afford to take their families there and it was special to them. So better not to judge them and just be grateful that there’s places for different tastes, cultures, and budgets. To them, they were eating like kings.
I think it's actually the opposite, ignorance is why people go to chains. They eat their steak well done because they've never had a good steak. Most chains like Applebees are using a lot of Chef Mike (the microwave).
It -is- snobbery, but the reverse of what you are thinking.
Someone who grew up only knowing about Velveeta, and never experiencing a French fromagerie might think, "Hey, I like this but it seems there's more to the world than Velveeta, I wonder what those thousands of other cheese are like." But instead of curiosity, many turn into this insane Trumpy parody like "Velveeta is the greatest cheese god and america ever created and all other cheese is evil commie propaganda!" bullshit. Its like they have to build their identity on the virtue of being proudly ignorant snobs and then accuse people that call them on it for being educated snobs.
No skin off my back, but try to consider the breadth of what is going on here.
A lot of chains can do better than Cheesecake Factory though. Back in Beijing there was a chain called Element Fresh that offered mostly western fusion, portion sizes were much smaller, the food was more tasteful.
Denny's is a surprisingly high variance experience in the US. Some regions are great, some are terrible. There are heuristics for finding a good one but I haven't eaten there in ages in any case.
I've only eaten there once or twice, I think they expanded to my area too late. One chain that stands out for huge portions was called Claimjumper. Looks like it's still around.
Claim Jumper is barely around, they have closed many locations in the past decade and Landry's sold the entire chain to a group of franchisees, if I remember correctly.
CJ was quite good back in the day but I have not been to one in years -- in my opinion, quality declined a bunch and doesn't match up with their prices. Cheesecake Factory, on the other hand, has maintained high quality, tasty food in generous portions (in my opinion).
Or you know, just eat half and take the other half home and eat it later. Of course, re-heating doesn't work as well with some dishes. I've found there are some places that would be too expensive for me and the only reason I eat there it because I can amortize the cost over 2 meals due to their larger portions; particularly if the food is re-heatable without a large degradation in quality. Think curries or other foods with lots of moisture.
I do when possible but I don’t always want to eat the leftovers again. But often we’ll be out and it’s just sitting in a container in the car and becoming increasingly unsafe to eat.
We used to like to get a few of the small plates and share, kind of like tapas from an alternate universe. Some of them are really excellent. They rotate those a lot though and last time we went we didn't find much on that page that really lit a fire. But if you do it's really a nice time, order a drink, share some plates, marvel at the Stargate architecture.
A lot of the time in general, depending on the restaurant, a couple apps or small plates are perfect for me these days. Less filler while getting some variety especially if I’m eating by myself.
My partner and I don’t go often, but when we do we order one main and a slice of cheesecake. Maybe a smaller appetizer if we’re particularly hungry. It’s a ton of food but it’s a good amount for two.
A lot of things don’t heat up well or you’re traveling and aren’t in a position to take leftovers home. It’s not even a uniquely US thing. I’ll often get an appetizer or two rather than a main.
When we go to the CCF we plan on having it for lunch/dinner the next day.
The portions are so large that if we plan on getting a cheesecake we order it so it comes after the meal. We actually don't like the cheesecakes so much; I like a thicker/heavier or a fluffier cheesecake, and the CCF cheesecakes are kind of right in the middle.
Agree on the portion sizes. The only time I've been we were next to a table of a college football team or something - like 20 huge guys, and I don't think many of them finished their portions (none of us did, we didn't even want cheesecake afterwards!)
Maybe not the right phrase but before having kids it wasn’t a place we’d go. Nothing against it, just went to other types of restaurants for a different type of experience.
But after kids your lifestyle changes (fancy restaurants at 8:30pm fade away) and you do different things, often based on their nap routine. So cheesecake was a place we tried since it’s super family friendly and near places we shop at. And it was surprisingly good.
We tried other chains and some were ok but many were not worth it imo. Cheesecake was the best overall in our assessment.
> Cheesecake was the best overall in our assessment.
Lol, yes, exactly, that's the consensus opinion (not "surprisingly," except among food snobs), and it's why the place is packed every night while many of its competitors have gone out of business. Sorry it took you so long to realize it.
Interestingly, one restaurant that had even more of this nostalgia vibe for me as a kid in the late 80’s, early 90’s was Pizza Hut.
I remember going there for parties and celebrations and having a nice sit down dinner. However, in the late 1990s, it went downmarket to try to compete with Dominos. The sit down experience greatly declined.