I went to Phoenix to spend time with my Grandmother. She is going to be 86 this year and has been having a bunch of health problems so when I told her I would be coming to town, she asked if I would take her to see her financial planner who works in this area. He is great and often drives all the way to Sun City West to see her or they conduct business over the phone and email. Since it is schlep for my mom to do this, I was happy to take her. We had an appointment around 1:15 and since Gram moves a bit slower than either of us expected, our plan to have lunch before the appointment didn't work out so we had lunch afterward. This is how we ended up at CF. She was starving and knew they had a lot of options and she didn't feel like Miracle Mile (and I knew I could eat at the one in Arrowhead)
Cheesecake Factory is CF. I know now that I like their burgers and I love their garden salad. It is full of great veggies like shredded zuchini and beets. Gram had the meatloaf and ate about 3/4 and then decided it wasn't as good as it used to be. I refused to let her send it back (one of her favorite things to do-eat more than half and then complain so she gets either a comped meal or another meal that she takes home for another time)-yes,I am outing her trick and she knows I am on to her....
She let me pay because I didn't let her send her food back. Luckily and our waitress was a doll who totally got it. She was from San Jose so we had a good time chatting about the Bay Area and the differences between here and there.
The reason why I am not giving this location 4 stars is because the slice of cheesecake we ordered had some nasty strawberries on it. I have a good taster and when I bit into one it was like biting into an overly acidic chemical taste. I told the waitress and she brought us a plain slice. The waitress told the manager who came over to tell me that NO ONE had ever complained about the strawberries before. I told him to taste one and he looked at me like I was crazy. A few minutes later, our waitress came to me to tell me that the manager did taste the strawberries and that I was right -DUH. Had he come back to tell me this himself, he would have bumped up the star rating in service...
Gram said she likes the location in the Arrowhead area better, though we did have a good time talking about all the changes in Phoenix and the Biltmore area.