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- EK’s Cheesecakes offers small batch and custom orders available for delivery, or pickup at Stadium Market in Ann Arbor.
- They also offer a rotating menu at their storefront in Milan on Fridays and Saturdays. EK’s Cheesecakes shares their storefront and kitchen with Rich Grains Bakery
The storefront of EK’s Cheesecakes is unassuming, sitting on a street corner directly across the street from a dispensary, and just seconds from the highway exit. And yet, the bakery’s steady stream of customers sometimes forms a line out the door.
Eric Kinsler-Holloway, the baker and businessman behind the bakery, emphasized the importance of patience and attention to detail when making a high-quality cake.
“There's ways that we can make the cheesecake faster, or make a little bit more out of the batter that we have,” Kinsler-Holloway said. “But we know when we cut corners, there's a potential that people might notice, and we don't want that.”
Regulars know Kinsler-Holloway for his rotating menu of cheesecakes, which includes flavors like lemon raspberry, baked apple, almond poppy, s'mores, and key lime. But he’s starting to experiment with muffins, brownies, tarts, and other baked goods.
Leaving old habits behind
The bakery is a hard pivot away from the type of business Kinsler-Holloway used to do. In 2011, he received a DUI and was put on probation. It wasn’t his first time. During previous probationary periods, he said, he had continued to grow and sell marijuana. But this time, he got caught for growing marijuana after his medical card had expired, and spent six months in jail.
“Somehow, on any probation I was on in the past, I was able to kind of skirt away and still do what I wanted… and never got caught,” Kinsler-Holloway said. “And it wasn't until being sober for about eight months that I realized that I was actually happier than I was ever before.”
In 2012, Kinsler-Holloway got sober and temporarily moved in with his mother. That Thanksgiving, she whipped out two New York-style cheesecakes that looked and tasted like “something that you would buy at a restaurant or a grocery store,” Kinsler-Holloway said.
He couldn’t believe she had baked them herself. She hadn’t done much cooking, much less any baking, throughout his childhood.
“[My mother] worked all day; single mom, just raising me and my brother,” Kinsler-Holloway said. “So she would come home, and she'd be tired. So we would eat out a lot for dinner.”
The following Christmas, he joined her in baking another cheesecake. He fell in love with the baking process, and cherished the opportunity to spend quality time with family.
“With being sober, I kind of finally realized what's important to me, which is family,” he said. “All I cared about was me, and what I wanted, and what I wanted to do, but it wasn't until I got sober that I realized that it's about the people around me.”
Building a bakery
Kinsler-Holloway eventually picked up work as a maintenance tech, but continued to hone his baking skills on the side. Soon, he was sharing his cheesecakes with friends and family, who encouraged him to take his hobby to the next level.
At first, he wasn’t convinced it was a dream worth pursuing. But with a son on the way, he said, he and his wife needed additional income.
“People were telling me, you should start selling these [cheesecakes],” he said. “But because they're my friends and family, I thought they were just kind of gassing me up… But I was like, ‘You know, we need money. I like making these cheesecakes. Let's just see what happens.’”
A friend helped him land a job at Zingerman’s Bakehouse in Ann Arbor, and Kinsler-Holloway quit his maintenance job. The goal, he said, was to learn the ropes so that he could open his own bakery after four to five years of training.
“Because this is what I wanted to do, this was my passion, it made sense to me,” he said. “So I was ready to take the pay cut. I was able to get the job at Zingerman's, and it was really just to see how a real bakery operated, because I knew that one day, this is what I wanted.”
While still at Zingerman’s, he started selling small batches of cakes as EK’s Cheesecakes. As demand grew, Kinsler-Holloway eventually left Zingerman’s and began investing fully in his own business.
His mother, he said, was his first employee.
“[My mother and I] have died laughing a few times…” he said. “But I think that's why our cheesecakes are also so great. It's like, mood through the food… And our cheesecakes are pretty great because we have a good time making them.”
His signature dish
Today, EK’s Cheesecakes offers small batch and custom orders available for delivery, or pickup at Stadium Market in Ann Arbor. They also share a storefront in Milan, Michigan with Rich Grains Bakery. The owner of Rich Grains, Kyle Purcell, is another Zingerman’s alumnus. On Fridays and Saturdays, customers can pick up cheesecakes, slices, croissants, focaccia, cookies, and other treats.
EK Cheesecake’s current bestseller, Kinsler-Holloway said, is the honey ricotta cheesecake.
“With the honey ricotta, what you're getting is a… creamier texture,” he said. “So it's not like your New York style where it's really dense. And the honey kind of offsets the ricotta, so it still has a little bit of the sweetness.”
His recipe incorporates local honey and a homemade butter and graham cracker crust. Over the years, Kinsler-Holloway has refined every detail, from baking temperature, to timing, to the type of honey used, to mixing techniques. After moving into a commercial kitchen, he had to readjust each factor.
“I think that's what I fell in love with, is just the creating, and kind of the science experiment of like, ‘Okay, let me change something to see what the outcome might be,’” he said.
EK’s Cheesecakes has been over a decade in the making, and Kinsler-Holloway hasn’t looked back.
“You know, from selling marijuana to selling cheesecakes is pretty crazy, but I wouldn't have it any other way,” he said.
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