I was looking at my stats just now, and I’m delighted to discover that my blog is the #4 Google result for the search string cheesecake factory sucks.

Yeah, I don’t like Cheesecake Factory, but not enough to merit a #4 ranking. Or so I thought!

Mangia, the best Italian restaurant in the region and definitely the best within a two-mile radius of my house, is closing. I didn’t go there as often as I would have liked. But that’s because I’m poor. I had a dish there involving ravioli, goat cheese, vegetables, and an alarming number of capers that I still daydream about periodically while cooking Italian food.

I found it on their site!

RAVIOLI ROSA PRIMAVERA
Tender pasta pillows filled with roasted red peppers and goat cheese, sauteed in a roasted garlic olive oil with an array of the seasons freshest vegetables…touched with a bit of red hot pepper, toasted pine nuts and goat cheese.
Price: $12.99

Better than Cheesecake Factory, and it isn’t a big enough portion for a family of four.

I’m not as angry as I initially was since I learned that the Albany location is opening again as a reconfigured, bigger restaurant, but I really liked Mangia, and I’m not driving to Slingerlands. Whine!

I am angry that the Cheesecake Factory is at least partly to blame, but not surprised. They’re around the same price, but Cheesecake Factory is more…mainstream? Accessible? Kid-friendly? I don’t know what it is, since it doesn’t seem like any of those things to me.

My friend who works at Crossgates tells me that business at that mall is down since the big chain restaurants opened at Colonie Center. I guess that people shop while they wait the two to three hours it takes to get a table at Cheesecake Factory, and don’t go to Crossgates.

Egg tip to All Over Albany, where I evidently get all of my news now.

P.S. WEGMANS LOVE!!!!