The Dirty Cheesecake opens in Smithtown
The Dirty Cheesecake in Smithtown features several varieties of frozen cheesecake on a stick. Credit: Newsday/Melissa Azofeifa
At just 17 years old, Deer Park resident Lili Hassanin has been instrumental in helping her father, Tarek Hassanin, open the family’s second bakery on Long Island.
The Dirty Cheesecake in Smithtown opened Oct. 26. Made By Lili’s, their first Long Island location, is in North Babylon.
The Smithtown shop's signature item is an extravagant cheesecake on a stick ($12.99), which is dipped in chocolate and sprinkled with a variety of toppings. Flavors range from raspberry madness to dulce de leche to a colorful Funfetti birthday cheesecake.
"We knew in order to have a successful store, we needed to have something different and something eye-catching," said Lili, who splits her time between the Smithtown and North Babylon shops on weekends and is involved in baking operations as well as helping customers and running the register.
Other popular desserts include banana pudding ($6.99) and slices of the three-layer Lili’s cheesecake with a chocolate chip brownie base, topped with cheesecake and cookie dough ($11.99). The Smithtown location also has an espresso bar and serves almond and chocolate croissants.
The airy, Tiffany blue-and-white space is adorned with an Instagram-able wall of fake greenery, flowers and neon lights. There are 16 seats for customers to enjoy their pastries on-site.
Inside The Dirty Cheesecake in Smithtown. Credit: Newsday/Melissa Azofeifa
Hassanin owned a limo company before venturing into the baking world professionally with Lili’s Bake Shop in Manhattan’s Times Square in 2016. The shop closed in 2022 so Hassanin could laser-focus on Long Island, opening the North Babylon spot in less than a year. Hassanin said the Smithtown location has been in the works for 14 months.
Julliana Pica, 20, from St. James, was drawn to the bakery from a TikTok video. "I’m not a huge cheesecake person honestly, but this was just so good," she said of the peanut butter Nutella cheesecake. "It was so decadent that I don’t know if I would eat it every single day, but it was a really good treat."
The Dirty Cheesecake, 102 W. Main St, Smithtown, 631-780-5320, thedirtycheesecake.com, Open 8 a.m.-midnight daily.
Melissa Azofeifa is a restaurants reporter with Newsday's FeedMe team. Having grown up on Long Island, she loves talking about food and its impact on culture. A graduate of Stony Brook University, she joined Newsday in the fall of 2024.
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