Last weekend it was my wife's pick and she decided to select the Cheesecake Factory at the Saint Louis Galleria Mall which we had not visited in a while. In fact, the last time I visited was over the Christmas holiday when I was meeting someone for a lunch over the break, so it had been over 8 months for me, and even longer for the others. I remembered the menu was pretty long, and it is actually more like a book. After a thorough reading of the tome, I decided to select the Factory Burrito Grande, my son picked the Americana Glamburger, my wife picked the California Cheesesteak sandwich and my mother-in-law selected the Chicken Salad Sandwich. We also selected two slices of cheesecake, with my son and I picking the Godiva Chocolate cheesecake and my wife and mother-in-law picking the Chocolate Mousse cheesecake.
As we waited for our order we noticed how ornately the ceiling was decorated which seemed elaborate for a mall restaurant, and how the seats were hard and the restaurant was noisy. They were playing some background music that you could hear, but it was so muddled you could not clearly make out the lyrics. For a Saturday lunch around noon it was maybe half full, but you could still hear a lot of ambient noise.
When our food arrived we were all pretty amazed at the very generous portions you receive there. The sandwiches were all large and my burrito was indeed "muy grande". I instantly portioned off about half of my burrito to take home as a second meal, especially since I knew we had ordered cheesecake. The burrito came with a dish of black beans, a big scoop of guacamole and a bunch of sour cream and some lettuce so I had plenty to eat before the cheesecake. The others all received a giant portion of fries as well which were decoratively served in a cup. I tried some and they were incredibly "average", definitely not that bad but nothing special either. With the enormous portions of our entrees we did not mind passing on the fries. Everyone enjoyed their sandwiches and burgers, and my mother-in-la even gave me half of hers (which I kept for another later lunch!) My burrito itself was very good, a nice blend of chicken, rice, cheese, onions and peppers which went well will the guacamole and sour cream. It was "grande" in length only with the width a manageable size to eat.
The cheesecakes arrived after we were all finished with our main entrees, and they were rich and sinful as expected. I tried both of them and I was glad we selected the Godiva Chocolate one which was richer and more flavorful than the Chocolate Mousse one. If you are going for the "heart attack" dessert, you may as well go all out!
All in all we were stuffed and enjoyed a very gluttonous, not so healthy lunch. It definitely makes you think about all those people in other parts of the world surviving on a handful of rice a day, when we Americans consume enough fat and calories in one meal which could last us a few days. But we did bring home some extra food (I ate my half burrito and half chicken sandwich for lunch yesterday - delicious!) The Cheesecake Factory definitely a good place for some sinful self indulgent eating.
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