62 PUNCHMAGAZINE.COM {food coloring} Namesake Cheesecake might be a lovely bakery name that rhymes, but its real purpose is to pay homage. Cherith is named after Cherith Lorraine Rickey, a dear family friend and neighbor. Longtime Peninsula diners certainly know Rickey and her husband John’s restaurants, including Dinah’s Shack, Rick’s Swiss Chalet and Rickey’s Hyatt. A stalwart dessert at those restaurants was a particular cheesecake: Cherith Lorraine Rickey’s cheesecake. However, as is the case with so many precious traditions from prior generations, this cheesecake recipe was never written down or virtually shared at all. At least that was the case until Cherith was the lucky—and only—recipient of the secrets of this cheesecake. “She looked at me and said, ‘Eight crackers,’” Cherith recalls on an unusually balmy autumn afternoon at her shop about how she slowly but surely learned the recipe while Rickey’s memory sadly was fading. “I promised her. I said, ‘Someday in my life I could do something with this recipe. I don’t know what, when or how. But I promise you, I will make this come back to life.’” Now Cherith’s been serving the cheesecake for over a decade to the likes of Jane Goodall, Clint Eastwood, several beloved nearby restaurants (Sundance the Steakhouse, Osteria and the Stanford Park Hotel, to name a few) and After each customer’s first bite of the signature dish at Menlo Park’s Namesake Cheesecake, there seems to always be a subtle “aha!” epiphany moment. “I didn’t know cheesecake could taste like that!” In a sea of dense cheesecakes, the one from Cherith Spicer’s charming shop is smooth and tangy—a Ferrari-cruising-downthe-highway kind of dessert. Besides the glorious first bite, guests often have one other sudden moment of realization that pulls together the Peninsula’s historic past and its current cheesecake virtuoso. CHEESECAKE slice of history words by TREVOR FELCH • photography by PAULETTE PHLIPOT
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