Best dessert

As the name suggests, there's a theatricality to Finale, Boston's premier "desserterie." It's in the very concept of serving light entrées as "preludes" to a main course of sweets -- after all, isn't dessert the stage-stealing diva of many a dinner? It's also in the décor, all crimson plush and golden glow. But above all, of course, it's in the desserts themselves -- executive pastry chef Nicole Coady uses genoise and dacquoise, mousse and ganache as artistic materials as much as ingredients; but for all your oohing over checkerboards and stripes, curlicues and rosettes, you'll be doing more aahing over inspired flavor combinations (white chocolate and lemon, say, or toffee and caramelized orange) that amount to plain old yumminess.

Ah, the Cheesecake Factory -- it's a pleasure so guilty they should write you up a ticket, rather than a check, when you're finished. Thirty-plus varieties of the namesake dessert make resistance futile even for the most determined dieter: from Key lime to cookie dough, peanut butter to pumpkin pecan, there's bound to be one calling your name. Fans of the California-based chain generally concede that the appetizers and entrées here are simply roadblocks on the way to whipped-cream-topped paradise -- but if you do make a wrong turn at some enormous portion, rest assured that you can get your slice of heaven, or even a whole box of it, to go.

Finale, 1 Columbus Avenue, (617) 423-3184; 30 Dunster Street, (617) 441-9797. The Cheesecake Factory, 115 Huntington Avenue, (617) 399-7777; 100 CambridgeSide Place, Cambridge, (617) 252-3810; 300 Boylston Street, Chestnut Hill, (617) 964-3001.