The very first Cheesecake Factory opened in Beverly Hills with a one-page menu, front and back. But boy, did they cram a lot into that one page.
While not nearly as extensive as the novella-sized menu provided to today’s Cheesecake Factory guests, the original 1978 menu included all-day breakfast dishes, hot and cold sandwiches, burgers, entrees, soups, salads, beverages and milkshakes. And of course there was a section dedicated to pastries, ice cream sundaes and the restaurant’s namesake cheesecake.
This cheesecake, after all, is the reason for the chain’s existence. CEO David Overton had previously said that his mother’s cheesecake recipes, which she developed at his childhood home in Michigan before opening a bakery in Los Angeles, was the impetus for his idea to open a dine-in eatery.
“I put together a concept around the cheesecakes,” Overton said in a 2013 interview with city officials in Novi, Michigan, near his hometown of Detroit. “I never wanted the chef to walk out on me, so I had to cook everything, and I wasn’t a cook. So it was a very simple menu, at the beginning.”
“Simple” might be a bit of an understatement. Not counting beverages, the 1978 menu comprises of over 100 dishes (depending on how each dish variation is counted), as compared to the current menu’s 250-plus offerings.
What was on the menu?
Many of the items on the original menu are nowhere to be seen on the current one. Standouts among those long-gone dishes include Oscar’s Special, a sardine-and-cream-cheese bagel sandwich named after Overton’s father, and the Wyoming Humdinger, which appeared to be a take on a Reuben sandwich, albeit with a choice of corned beef, pastrami or roast beef, and with coleslaw and thousand island dressing in place of the more traditional sauerkraut and Russian dressing.
There was also plenty of tuna and crab salad on the menu (served as-is, or in sandwiches, or stuffed into an avocado) along with daily quiches and a salad bar where guests could “make their own” plate.
What wasn’t on the menu?
Noticeably absent, however, are the steaks, pastas, pizzas and most other fusion-type dishes that the Cheesecake Factory offers today. Look close, and it also becomes apparent that a staple of the current menu — french fries or any other deep-fried foods — are nowhere to be found. The reason, according to Overton, was because he didn’t know how to operate a deep-fryer.
“We definitely had a fresh approach,” Overton once told Thrillist, “but partly, that’s because I didn’t know what I was doing.”
Over time, the Cheesecake Factory’s menu expanded as Overton became more familiar with the restaurant industry. He would incorporate dishes he himself enjoyed, as well as items his customers were asking about. The idea, according to Overton, was to satisfy anyone and everyone who would walk through the doors.
Even today, the company reexamines its menu (no small undertaking, considering the size of the behemoth) twice per year, removing select items but always adding more.
“There’s surely something for everyone. And that’s something that most restaurants don’t offer these days,” Overton once boasted in an old recruitment video.
“There’s nothing America wants to eat that we can’t serve at the Cheesecake Factory,” he said.
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