Cuisines: Family Style, American, Take Out, Dessert
Alcohol: Full Bar
Price Range: Average
A meal break at this national chain, which evolved from a single neighborhood cheesecake bakery into a California-based multi-location dining concept, is always comfortably predictable. The ruling idea seems to be: Diners want mammoth portions of casual fare they can count on --- and cheesecake, lots of cheesecake. All outposts offer classic American comfort food, as well as CF's own middle-of-the-road take on global fusion-style dishes. From a menu of over 200 items, it's most fun to put together an eclectic communal grazing meal of appetizers like spicy-battered popcorn shrimp and buttery sweet corn tamale cakes. Burgers, salads and sandwiches make a major meal-and-a-half; meat or seafood entrées and pastas might fill two or three normal stomachs. And three guesses as to what leads the dessert list, in flavors from Oreo cookie to white chocolate. Latin flavors are represented by crispy Cuban rolls (basically an Asian spring roll stuffed with traditional Cuban sandwich ingredients); health-consciousness is apparent in the salad of kale and quinoa. Almost everything is tasty, and there's almost nothing on the menu that kids wouldn't eat, which is why the restaurants are frequently packed with families.
