In case you missed it, last Friday, cheesecake was the toast of the city in Albany.
"I, Kathy M. Sheehan, mayor of the city of Albany, do hereby proclaim Friday June, 30th 2017 to be Cheesecake Machismo day in the city of Albany and ask the residents to join me in congratulating Lynn and Bam on this extraordinary accomplishment, and thanking them for their fantastic eatery to Albany, and wishing Cheesecake Machismo continued success in the future."
The little shop in the shadow of the South Mall, which opens every noon to people queued up along Hamilton Street and closes sometimes mere hours later when the cheesecake runs out, began as a hobby around a dozen years ago for owners Bam and Lynn Lynch ...
"It's amazing, says Bam. "This isn't something you even expect could happen. It's like David and Goliath. You know, a little tiny cheesecake shop, first in all, of New York. Our customers are the ones. That's why we're here."
Lynn chines in: "Well we do get a lot of out-of-state, out-of-country visitors from our online reviews and we know a lot of people in the neighborhood but we still meet new people everyday."
The reason for all the fuss: Yelp, a national firm that publishes crowd-sourced reviews about local businesses, declared the shop makes the best cheesecake in the state of New York.
Daniel Berman is the community ambassador for Yelp in the Capital Region. "Delish.com wrote an article about the best cheesecake in every state. And what they did to determine that was they looked at Yelp reviews to find which was the best cheesecake anywhere, and here in New York state it was Cheesecake Machismo. Their Yelp reviews are amazing, and the feat that they have achieved on Yelp is that they have almost 200 reviews and five stars. An average of 200 reviews, that's almost unheard of."
A slice of cheesecake, which, by the way comes in nearly 600 flavors, along with a drink will set you back $6….and a few hundred calories. If this broadcast has you hankering to try a piece, you'll have to wait until the shop re-opens Thursday at noon.
