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Iconic Food #1: Junior's Cheesecake

1010 WINS Iconic Food:  Junior's Cheescake
Junior's Cheescake (From Junior's Cheesecake Facebook page)

There's cheesecake, and then there's Junior's Cheesecake. Since its opening in 1950, Junior's Restaurant has been downtown Brooklyn's shiny, red and gold anchor, drawing hungry crowds, deal-making politicians and celebs with the munchies from all over the city. Home to one of the planet's most legendary desserts, Junior's may not have put Brooklyn on the map, but it undeniably locked in its rep as the cheesecake capital of the world.


 

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A Visionary with a Sweet Tooth Gets His Start

Born in 1904, Harry Rosen was just another kid from the gritty, Lower East Side. He dropped out of school to become a drugstore soda jerk and quickly realized he had a knack for the restaurant business. Pooling his resources, Rosen opened up a sandwich shop called the Enduro, and then another, ultimately owning four Enduros in the city and one in Brooklyn. Successful from the start, the sandwich shop became part Steakhouse, part bar and featured live entertainment. World War II came and went, and Rosen, sniffing a gold mine in the making, sold off his four Manhattan shops to focus on his favorite Brooklyn location. He changed it up to reflect a modernized and family-friendly menu able to attract returning vets and their families. He revamped the cavernous, 400-seat restaurant, changed the name to reflect his ongoing, working relationship with sons Marvin and Walter, and set off in search of the perfect cheesecake recipe.


 

The Best Gets Better

Rosen scoured the country, bringing home cheesecakes of every type to analyze, dissect and improve upon. Ultimately, he landed upon the stuff of dreams when he, along with restaurant head baker Eigel Petersen, created the impossibly smooth and rapturously silky cheesecake which would put Junior's on the map.
 
No one could get enough, and soon Junior's was the place to see and be seen. Downtown Brooklyn moviegoers landed there after matinees. High school students celebrated graduation there, and Brooklyn's politicians flocked inside the plush, orange interior for some "one of the people" exposure and a slice of Heaven on Earth.
 
In 1973, Junior's won a best cheesecake contest run by New York Magazine, and the creamy floodgates opened in earnest. Athletes, movie stars and New York royalty, from City Hall to Broadway, made their way over the Manhattan Bridge on a regular basis to get their fill of different varieties.  From cherry crumb to chocolate swirl, nothing anywhere remotely tasted like a Junior's cheesecake. Rosen retired at around that time to enjoy the good life in Florida, leaving his sons to run the highly profitable and well respected business. He died in 1996 at the age of 92.


 

Still a Family Affair

Featuring a full menu of hearty food, the restaurant eventually expanded back into Manhattan and currently has locations in Grand Central Terminal, Times Square and Foxwoods Casino in Connecticut. Nothing can rival the legendary Brooklyn location, however, which still stands tall, holding court on the corner at its original location.
 
Currently managed by a third generation of Rosens, Junior's traditional and seasonal cheesecakes can now be ordered online and shipped anywhere, along with a line of memorabilia from cups to cookbooks.


 

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Corey Whelan is a freelance writer in New York. Her work can be found at Examiner.com.

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