A tiny SC restaurant cooked up a viral hit. It’s all about the Christmas cheesecake

The hanging sign out front at Sweet Caroline’s restaurant in McConnells lists food, family and friends as hallmarks of the business. After becoming a viral sensation, the owner may want to consider adding Facebook.

The western York County smokehouse known for its brisket, smoked prime rib and custom cheesecakes flavors brought back a dessert it introduced about this time last year. Sweet Caroline’s posted a photo on Facebook of a cheesecake inspired by the popular Little Debbie Christmas Tree Cakes.

Within days the social media post had more than 4 million views and 17,000 likes. As of Monday morning that also included about 5,600 comments and 7,700 shares.

“It kind of overwhelmed us at first because within two days I had 250 requests to ship the cheesecakes,” said manager Steven Brousseau. “And that’s when I kind of had to come in with the second post and explain we’re a tiny restaurant in a town of 300 people.”

Commenters wanted cheesecake in Alabama, Oklahoma, Oregon, California and Washington. One decided to change Christmas plans from an Orlando to a Spartanburg family gatheringADD, still about an hour away, to swing by for cake. On Friday afternoon Brousseau skipped out to the post office to mail a t-shirt and birthday card to a new fan from North Carolina who wanted it for his wife, Caroline.

Then, there are the locals. They hunger for it too.

“As many as we can get into the restaurant,” Brousseau said of the Christmas tree cheesecakes, “they’re gone.”

Food and Facebook

Brousseau and baker Paula Nance worked together at Grumpy Brothers near the hospital in Rock Hill. It was a burger joint known for its cupcakes that closed during COVID, about the same time Sweet Caroline’s opened in McConnells.

Sweet Caroline’s is a fusion of talent from some of Rock Hill’s best known eateries like Michael’s Rock Hill Grille, Ebenezer Grill and the White Horse.

“It’s almost more of a cult following out here,” Brousseau said. “We have a lot of people who come out here considering how far away we are from everything. The closest towns to us are 10 miles away.”

Sweet Caroline’s is next to a weekend flea market, a gun shop and plenty of open land. Even the 15-minute drive from Rock Hill to McConnells typically parallels and bypasses its stretch of Chester Highway.

“People make the drive out here because the food is good,” Brousseau said.

Some drive up from Georgia. Some reroute family visits to eat there. Still, it’s a challenge to stay top of mind for potential diners. The restaurant routinely posts daily specials online.

“It’s Facebook and word of mouth,” Brousseau said.

So why did one cheesecake post go viral?

“I don’t know,” he said. “I’m guessing it was just people seeing it and sharing it. It’s that time of year when the Christmas cakes are coming out and some people just love those Christmas tree cakes.”

Last year Nance made six cheesecakes a week. The past two weeks she’s made about 50. Another 20 through the weekend, Brousseau said Friday, another 20 Thanksgiving week and 20 more for Thanksgiving day are on the schedule just from people ordering whole cakes.

Nance typically works in the kitchen and bakery, but had to cut the kitchen hours to focus on Christmas tree cheesecakes. Nance can make up to 20 a day.

Cutting the cheesecakes

Brousseau said there will be plenty of cheesecakes for dine-in guests. The plan is to have them through New Year’s. Sweet Caroline’s won’t, however, be shipping slices or cakes across the country.

At $45 for a 12-slice cake — slices are $5.99 in the restaurant — the shipping for a dairy product in need of refrigeration makes shipping unreasonable. Brousseau said some folks online said wanted one and they’d pay whatever, but $130 for a cheesecake was too rich for him.

“Whether they want to pay it or not,” he said, “I would feel guilty about it.”

Plus, there are logistics for a restaurant that already pre-ordered 200 boxes of Christmas tree cakes that can be hard to find this time of year. “There would be no Christmas tree cakes in the area,” Brousseau said. “We would have to buy them all.”

There are plans for something new, if Sweet Caroline’s can handle another cheesecake frenzy. They haven’t posted it to the restaurant site yet but a chocolate version will follow.

Brousseau braces for what that announcement might bring.

But Sweet Caroline’s isn’t about the likes, clicks, shares or even the burgeoning business a viral trend might grow, he said.

“Our goal here isn’t so much to get rich in the restaurant industry,” he said. “It’s to help make people’s day better, make their lives better.”