The Brunch Project, Part 3

Today was one of those lovely California winter days, warm and sunny and blue with the streets jammed full of cute guys in tee shirts.  If you had seen the arms on this redhead in the subway, you would join me in cheering on global warming.

I was out in their midst because I had a doctor appointment down in the excessively touristy neighborhood of Union Square.  Since Secret Agent Fred lives near there, we agreed to join up for an afternoon of boy ogling and brunch.  I know 4:00 pm is not considered "brunch" by many of the narrow minded but since I don't get up until 2:00 in the afternoon any more, I figure it's my brunch if I say so.  Bitches.

Trying to eat in the middle of the afternoon has its drawbacks, mostly, the very few places serving.  So we wound up in the Cheesecake Factory, on the top floor of Macy's.  I know, I know.  We live in a city renowned for its exciting and varied dining scene and we tuck into a chain that you could find in Boise.  

A menu that's a book.  Twenty two pages.   I looked for a table of content, but couldn't find it.  The waitress was charming and laughed at how perplexed we were by the size of it.  "Lunch is on page 8," she tipped us.

I ordered a salad off the "Skinnylicous" menu because I  sort of love made up words.  I have no idea what the "skinny" part was supposed to be, since when it came it was a huge mound of greens, a couple of pounds at least, with all sorts of odd scraps dumped on, goat cheese and chicken and mushy pears.  It had absolutely no flavor except sort of sweet, as if the dressing was made out of liquified Milky Way bars.  As most of the other patrons were enormous fat chicks, I suppose the management knows what the customers demand.

Fortunately, I also had ordered fish and chips, definitely not skinny-anything, but tasty.  And then we spilt a piece of cheesecake for desert.

I give them a D, mostly because it is exactly the kind of evil corporate dining experience you expect.  And the coffee sucked.