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Peteet’s Famous Cheesecakes Oak Park MI – Metro Detroit Bakery
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Peteet’s Famous Cheesecakes Oak Park MI – Metro Detroit Bakery |
Peteet’s Famous Cheesecakes in Oak Park: A Detroit-Built Success Story |
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A Detroit-Built Success Story
Peteet’s Famous Cheesecakes in Oak Park, Michigan, is one of the most respected scratch bakeries in Metro Detroit.
Some people find their calling. Patrick Peteet's calling found him — in the middle of everything falling apart.
It was 2008, and the real estate market had just collapsed. Patrick, who had built his career in real estate since the age of 18, watched the industry he had given his adult life to crumble almost overnight. He was staring down the kind of moment that breaks some people and transforms others. For Patrick, it became a turning point he never saw coming — and one he would eventually be grateful for.
Because Patrick Peteet already had a gift. He just had not yet let the world pay for it.
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The Recipe Was Always There
Long before there were wholesale accounts, long before there were restaurants calling in orders, long before there were 90 flavors and a bakery on 9 Mile Road, there was an 11-year-old kid in a kitchen baking cheesecakes and giving them away to anyone who would take one.
That was Patrick. And for decades, the cheesecakes were just something he did for love — for family, for friends, for the pure satisfaction of watching someone take a bite and close their eyes. He never imagined it would become a business. He did not need to imagine it, because everyone around him already knew.
When real estate dried up, the requests started coming in. Friends. Neighbors. People who had tasted what he made and were not willing to let it disappear. Buy them. Sell them. Make more. The message was consistent enough that Patrick could not ignore it.
Then in 2010, he lost the family business his late father had built. That grief, layered on top of everything else, could have been the end of the story. Instead, Patrick took his father's memory, a family cheesecake recipe, and every ounce of resilience he had left — and he opened Peteet's Famous Cheesecakes on September 6, 2010, in Oak Park, Michigan.
The date is not a coincidence. It is a marker. A before and after. |
What Happens When You Refuse to Take Shortcuts
Walk into Peteet's and you will understand immediately that this is not a place that cuts corners. Patrick has built his entire reputation on a simple but uncompromising philosophy: do it right, every single time.
The cheesecakes at Peteet's are made from scratch, every day, with no preservatives and no shortcuts. The ingredient list is intentionally simple — Philadelphia cream cheese, fresh cracked eggs, vanilla extract, and a graham cracker crust. That simplicity is intentional. It is what lets the quality speak.
But the signature move — the thing that makes Peteet's unlike any other cheesecake you have tasted — is the two-layer build. Every cheesecake is baked twice. A second layer is added and baked directly on top of the first, creating a texture and depth that you cannot replicate with a single pour. It is denser. Creamier. More complex. Once you understand what you are eating, it changes how you experience it.
Thirty flavors rotate through the retail location at any given time, but Patrick has recipes for over 90. He creates new and exotic flavors monthly, personally, because this is still the work of a man who genuinely loves what he does. Superman. Sweet Potato. Turtle. Key Lime. Strawberry Delight. Cheesecake cannolis. Cheesecake banana pudding. Cakes, cupcakes, and cookies that carry the same standard of quality that built the name.
Four years after opening the Oak Park location, demand grew large enough that a second location followed in West Bloomfield. Today, Peteet's supplies over 100 restaurants across Michigan. The kid who used to give cheesecakes away for free is now a wholesale operation that feeds a significant slice of Metro Detroit's dining scene.
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More Than Dessert — A Detroit Story
There is something deeply Metro Detroit about what Patrick Peteet built. This is a city that understands reinvention. A region that has watched industries collapse and watched its people find ways to rise out of the rubble. Patrick's story is not unusual here — but what he built from it is extraordinary.
He started serving this community as a teenager. At 18, straight out of high school, he was a professional realtor working in Metro Detroit. That means Patrick has had skin in this community for over three decades. He knows these streets. He knows these people. And when the community needed him to show up differently, he did.
What strikes you when you talk to Patrick is how he describes the customers who come through his doors. He talks about serving all cultures, all backgrounds, all walks of life. He talks about the moment when someone tastes a cheesecake and smiles — even if they do not share a language with him. That smile, he will tell you, is the whole point. He calls it heaven sent. The ability to hand someone a slice of something and watch their face change — that is what keeps him going.
That kind of purpose does not come from a business plan. It comes from a person who genuinely believes he is supposed to be doing exactly this. |
Where Peteet's Is Headed
Patrick is not standing still. His current focus is expansion — specifically, getting Peteet's tri-flavor cookies into grocery stores and an 8-inch Superman cookie into pizzerias across the region. These are not small moves. Grocery placement means Peteet's Famous Cheesecakes could soon be a name you see in stores you already visit every week.
For anyone who has not yet experienced the two-layer difference, the retail location is at 13835 W. 9 Mile Road in Oak Park. It is the kind of place that earns regulars fast. First-time customers tend not to stay first-timers for long.
The website at www.peteetscheesecakes.com is the best place to explore the full menu, learn about wholesale options, and stay up to date on the monthly flavor drops that Patrick creates himself. |
Why Peteet’s Is Made in the D
Built in Oak Park.
Peteet’s isn’t just a bakery. It’s a Detroit-built business that turned loss into growth — and kept its standards intact.
That’s what Made in the D stands for. |
Made in the D feature: A Word from Patrick
When asked what he wants readers to take away from his story, Patrick did not talk about cheesecake. He talked about dreams.
"If you want to start your business, do it," he said. "Don't leave your dreams on earth. Make them a reality while you're living."
That is the kind of advice that lands differently when it comes from someone who lost a career, lost a family business, and then built something that now feeds over 100 restaurants and counting. Patrick Peteet did not find a backup plan. He found his purpose.
And it tastes like the kind of two-layer cheesecake you only get when someone refuses to take shortcuts. |
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Located at 13835 W. 9 Mile Road in Oak Park, Michigan
Explore the full menu at www.peteetscheesecakes.com |
Frequently Asked Questions
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