Meet the man who has tasted everything on the Cheesecake Factory’s ridiculously long menu
LOS ANGELES -- The Cheesecake Factory’s official taste tester leaned toward a massive mound of steaming, parsley-flecked rice and jabbed his fork into a chunk of glistening cashew chicken.
He closed his eyes for a moment, considering the texture of the dish, a longtime staple that, after a couple-year hiatus, would soon return to the chain’s menu.
“Not as soft as I’d like it,” he told the executive chef, who nodded.
Next, he turned to the seared ahi tuna salad, but he doesn’t like fish, so he took a single bite of lettuce and radish before confidently setting down his fork.
“Nicely dressed. Great crunch!”
Third up was Cajun salmon with mashed potatoes and corn. He dredged a spoonful of potatoes through the sauce and his lips wiggled from side to side. He nodded twice.
“OK, delicious.”
In the 46 years since he opened the first Cheesecake Factory restaurant in Beverly Hills and grew it into the behemoth of casual dining with locations across the globe, David Overton — the company’s official taster, but also its chief executive and co-founder — has built a deep trust in the profitability of his own palate.
Overton has tasted and approved every one of the menu’s more than 250 items, which despite the factory in its name, the company likes to emphasize are prepared from scratch on site or at the company’s two bakeries.
“What I like, millions of people like,” Overton, 77, said on a recent morning at the company’s Calabasas
