Villani's Bakery

Let me set the stage. My birthday was on a Tuesday, but the big celebration? Sunday dinner. Friends. Family. A gathering of the finest people in my life. I told my wife, “Please, no grocery store cheesecake this year—get the real deal. A proper New York cheesecake. Go big or go home.” She found a charming bakery in Charlotte. Small business. Local. A $70 New York cheesecake was ordered, along with a $7 slice of Italian Crème Cake for herself. We even pre-tipped $15 because, hey, support small biz, right? Total damage? About $96. We pick it up. The place is cute. We’re excited. Fast forward to that evening: candles lit, “Happy Birthday” sung, the cheesecake sliced ceremoniously. I hand out pieces with pride, ready to bask in creamy glory. But something’s… off. One by one, eyebrows raise. Faces twist. Confused stares bounce around the table like a game of Clue. This wasn’t New York cheesecake. This was… citrus. The unmistakable zing of lemon and orange. A flavor that screams “Florida spring break” more than “Manhattan dessert classic.” I called the bakery—still calm, still hopeful. I asked, “Hey, I think we got the wrong cheesecake. This tastes like lemon and orange, not NY-style.” She replies: “Does it have orange slices in it?” Me: “Actually… yeah. What?” Her response: “That’s our New York cheesecake. We make it with lemon and orange slices.” I paused. Internally, the needle scratched across the record. This wasn’t a mix-up. This was their intentional version of a “New York cheesecake.” Reinvented. Redefined. Citrus-fied. A bold choice, sure—but also, absolutely not what anyone would expect when ordering a NY cheesecake. We returned to the bakery—still calm, still polite—to see if they’d make it right. Nope. “Email the company,” they said. No refund, no exchange, no effort. Just a shrug and “sorry.” At this point, it wasn’t even about the cake. It was about principle. It was about justice. It was about warning future generations of this culinary bait-and-switch. Let me be clear: lemon and orange slices have no place in a New York cheesecake. That’s not an opinion. That’s dessert law. Ask anyone—your grandma, a pastry chef, a man on the street. NY cheesecake is rich, creamy, vanilla-forward, maybe with a graham cracker crust. That’s it. Not a citrus fruit in sight. We ended up favoring a $10 Harris Teeter gluten-free cheesecake sampler over this $70 boutique disappointment. And honestly? That store-bought cheesecake won the popular vote. By a landslide. So here’s my suggestion to the bakery: 1. Call your cake what it is—Lemon Citrus Cheesecake. 2. Don’t gaslight your customers. When someone orders a classic dessert, then politely calls to ask why it tastes like a citrus grove, the answer shouldn’t be a casual “That’s how we make it.” 3. Consider that some people have citrus allergies and you’ve made no effort to disclose this bold creative decision. I hate leaving 1-star reviews, actually this is my first ever, but I felt it was my duty. For the next unsuspecting soul who just wants a real birthday cheesecake without a splash of scandal.

Stopped in briefly- can you really do that? No… so many delicious choices. We left with a bacon cheddar biscuit, 6 gluten free macarons, a cream puff and slice of olive cake. The family Biscuit cone-suer said the biscuit was low on flavor . The rest of our order over the moon delicious!