this weekend, i was at the national gallery of art to check out the turner exhibit (which was meh – i’m not a big fan of landscape painting) and ended up at the cafe to enjoy some overdue new york times reading.

as i was in line to get a cup of coffee, i saw this:

yup. pumpkin cheesecake with white chocolate shavings on top. a true work of art in and of itself.

but did it taste as good as it looked?

like the turner exhibit: meh.

i liked the taste and consistency of the pumpkin cheesecake filling. i didn’t like the gumminess of the outer layer of the cake. i ended up breaking through that and trying to scrape out the sweet goodness inside.

and while i loved the hazelnut garnish on the top, the crusty pedastal upon which the cheesecake was based was crumbly and tasteless. it wasn’t much of a crust. i left most of that on my plate.