On July 30th, the staff at Eileen’s Special Cheesecake was well prepared for the influx of fans coming in to help celebrate the legendary bakery’s 50th anniversary and National Cheesecake Day. At 11 am there were already about 50 people on line coming in to get their generous sample of the newest flavor of cheesecake, Strawberry Charlotte, and get half price on the 6” and individual cheesecakes. I treated myself to the Salted Caramel 6” cheesecake and I can’t believe that I made it all the way home without eating it! It was my best food deal of the month—at only $14.45 it was so well worth it to be able to taste this amazing flavor for the first time!
The crowd was orderly and the staff was super efficient so the line moved fast—even better, guests got to meet Eileen’s daughters Bonnie Ponte and Holly Maloney who are now running the business! Even Eileen’s granddaughters were on hand to help dole out the treats! Ah yes, I almost forgot to mention that new chef Anna McGorman was on hand to talk about her job and how she developed the great new Strawberry Charlotte (you can never go wrong when you add strawberries and chantilly cream to the top of a cheesecake).
People who lined up got not only cheesecake but fun merch like Eileen’s logo lip balm, stickers and bag clips. There were some great homemade lemonade and ice tea drinks available as well. As a note for the future, photos of the numerous drinks are on poster hanging on the right side of the counter. I tried the peach lemonade and was blown away. I plan to go back and have it again plus many more flavors.
If you do not live in the NYC area and are dying to try an Eileen’s cheesecake, you can order one on goldbelly.com—however, nothing beats venturing down to 17 Cleveland Place in Noho to see all the flavors lined up in one place including Plain, Key Lime, Blueberry, Strawberry and Salted Caramel. I am so happy that I got to spend National Cheesecake Day at Eileen’s Special Cheesecake. It touches my heart to see family businesses thrive for 50 years or more especially given all the changes in their immediate neighborhood over that period of time. You can see that the staff loves their jobs and the customer service level is so reliable and friendly. For more info, go to eileenscheesecake.com.
