The Cheesecake Factory — Restaurant in Freehold Township

Here’s my response to the email survey they sent me. I was so upset that our very rare nice night out we planned was derailed I’ve never had a bad experience at cheesecake factory until last night. I’ve been telling my Bf we have to go to cheesecake factory for the best veggie burger he’ll ever have. What a disappointment! I had no idea the menu changed and of course, the two things that I love and always order were removed. Why the beet salad?? Why? People loved that! I only knew about it because so many people talked about it. I’ve been ordering it for years. I should have known when it wasn’t on the menu, I should’ve known that the whole menu might have changed. I just blindly ordered my other favorite, the veggie burger. Why would you change the veggie burger?? Yet another thing that people raved about. I only knew about it because someone told me it’s the best veggie burger you’re ever going to find. And they were right! And I’ve been ordering and absolutely loving that for years. What the heck is that disgusting mush that I was presented with last night?? What the hell is that?! It just seemed like rice put in a mold and dumped on bread. It fell apart all over the place when we tried to choke it down because we paid good money for this crap “burger” and just wanted to have a nice time. And it was on sandwich bread?! Why?? It’s not a sandwich, my God. And it wasn’t even hot. I’m not even sure if your new monstrosity of a veggie burger is supposed to be hot or cold. Unbelievable that you would remove really great food from the menu and replace it with something terrible. It was so awful that as I sat there, so disappointed and sad that I brought someone to who I raved about this veggie burger for so long (and also the beet salad), all I could think of was that I don’t want it and I’m not going to feel forced to eat it and I don’t want to pay this much money for something so awful. And also I felt very much like this was a sneaky dirty trick because I ordered a veggie burger and this is definitely not something that could ever be considered a veggie burger. It’s a cold mold of rice, call it what it is. Our waiter, who was amazing throughout, was not so amazing when presented with an issue. I grabbed his attention while he was running by and I began saying I’m not eating this because this is not what it’s supposed to be…. And he just started talking over me about how he doesn’t know anything about veggie burgers because he’s a meat eater and then he just continued running by while my mouth was left open in shock at this bizarre exchange. My bf made the best of it, but for me, our whole special night was ruined because I did nothing but talk about how he’s going to love the beet salad and the veggie burger at cheesecake factory. And I think I’ve said enough, so I’m not even going to mention how we just trusted you when we saw mango and lime together in a cheesecake, knowing full well that lime could never be a good compliment, to the perfect taste that mango naturally has. Just totally trusted you to have done the work and tested these two flavors together. You couldn’t come up with just mango cheesecake? Who the hell is making these ridiculous decisions at corporate?? Could you please fire...

I have always enjoyed The Cheesecake Factory, but after today's experience I will never go back to this location (Raceway Mall in Freehold, NJ). I was alone and waited a few minutes for a server. They were moderately busy and I wasn't in a rush so no big deal. The issues came once I received my order. I often order the Farfalle with Chicken and Roasted Garlic, it is one of my faves. The description of the dish states that it comes in a "Roasted Garlic-Parmesan Cream Sauce" There was no cream in the dish, it was a very watery sauce. I tried it and it didn't have much flavor. I mentioned this to the waiter and he said he could replace it but I would most likely get the same dish back (the sauce would be the same). I decided to try eating it. The chicken and pasta were both overcooked. When the waiter came back I asked to get something else. He said he would grab me a menu and brb...that took longer than expected, but I don't know how many other tables he had or where they were located so he could have been busy. I ordered another dish - Grilled Chicken Avocado Club, something else I have had before and enjoyed. The herb mayo was practically non existent on the sandwich and as I neared the end of eating, I saw a short dark hair on the plate. I am a long haired red head so it definitely wasn't mine. At that point I couldn't wait to leave. I asked for the bill and after getting it pointed out the hair on the plate. I gave my card to the waiter to run and when he returned he offered me a free slice of cheesecake and an apology for the hair. I did not want to eat anything else there so I declined, signed the check (and tipped him 20%) and left. At no time did a manager come over to my table so either the waiter didn't tell them what was going on or they didn't feel the need to speak with me. I went to the host stand and asked to speak to a manager. I thought they should know about the issues with the food. I waited...and waited. The host did get busy and was helping people that came in, but I then saw them speaking to a manager and they still did not come over to me. They walked away in the other direction. At that point, I just wanted to leave, so I did. I worked in the food service industry as a waitress and bartender for years and any manager I worked with would have been alerted of the issue the customer was having at the table (even if just to remove the first meal from the bill!) and would have made a point to speak to the customer. The food issues were not the waiter's fault, although the comment about me getting the same dish again, was not how I think it should have been handled. Also, as having worked in the industry, I hate to send food back and I am understanding of issues happening, this was just an all around...

Fine food. Poor service. Got there to put our names down at 5 and we’re not sat at a table until 6:20. This wouldn’t be a problem except for the fact that I was told the wait was 30 minutes and instead was an hour and 20. Around 35 minutes of waiting and noticing people who had gotten there after us were being sat, I asked the host how much longer and he responded that it would be an additional 15 minutes. After waiting another 20 minutes I asked the host again and was told we were next on the list. 10 minutes later we finally got a text that our table was ready and we’re told to wait to the right of the stand to be sat. 15 minutes and 9 other parties sat later were still standing there waiting to be sat. I finally approached the stand again explaining our frustrations and was told the new hostess messed up and never assigned us a table after texting us so thats why no one brought us to our table. I mean seriously? 4 hostess’s and not one of them notice a party of 5 standing there for 15 minutes waiting to be sat? After this exchange a women dressed very nicely brought us to our table immediately which was appreciated but no “sorry for our mistake” was issued. Our server didn’t approach for another 10 minutes and it was a while before we got our drinks. She was very friendly but seemed rushed and like she was having a hard time handling her tables. Her appearance was also messy and i know servers can get sometimes disheveled when they have so many tables but I mean she could’ve at least fixed her hair so it was all pulled back instead of pieces hanging out. Our appetizers came out pretty quickly considering how long we had to wait for everything else and were AMAZING. Just the appetizers alone started to make me change my mind about the place and then our entrees came out. They were equally as amazing however one of our dinners had a hair in it. This was so unfortunate cause obviously after noticing we began to question how sanitary the rest of our food was and couldn’t bring ourselves to finish. Management did the right thing by taking the entree and a dessert off our bill and we were very appreciative of that. However one of the managers said that it wasn’t a hair and it was a string from the corn? For one the entree didn’t even have corn and two I know the lighting is bad in there but we inspected the plate with a flashlight from our phones and it was most definitely a hair. I’m super disappointed in this experience because the food was so amazing! The customer service was just very poor! I’m not sure if this place and their staff are still recovering from pandemic times but either way I hope they...