Panera Bread

I love panera bread! This specific location has always provided great service to me. Their food is always fresh and tastes great. It is a great place to meet up with friends or sit down and do homework while enjoying food! Their panera rewards program is also really great. It is free, so you should enroll for discounts and free items! :)

Today is the first time I visit the Panera Bread restaurant. I ordered a ½ Italian Combo Sdw and get the pager at 2pm. I wait for at least 30 mins, and finally after the second time I ask where is my sandwich. One of employee notice they did not trigger my pager and give my order to another person. They made another sandwich, and thanks for that I am late for an appointment at 3.
Beside this unpleasure order. This restaurant is very hot too. They turned the AC off and only few poor fan working.

Don’t get me wrong. The food is always delicious. However, they are pretty expensive for a place that cooks all the paninis at 6 in the morning and then leaves them in a fridge for the day.
They also overcharge for the soup considering the fact that is has been frozen in a bag for a few days and then warmed up in warm water.
They do have the loyalty card which does come in handy but you have to be a regular customer to actually receive good rewards.

The food was what I expected from Panera. The apple Fuji salad was delicious. My wife enjoyed her salad too. Although, they forgot to put dressing on her salad. When I brought it to their attention that they forgot the dressing they insisted that they did, but gave me salad dressing still. The most irritating part was that after we started to eat, they decided to clean around our table. They were cleaning the AC vent and the hanging light fixtures that were hanging above and around the table. A little consideration would be nice! Having dirt fall on you from above, and around you, is not a pleasant way to eat your food.

Like most chains on Green, it’s okay for a meal, but it’s not exceptional in any way. This place is often times packed for lunch, but I can’t imagine it’s because the food is so great, or the price is good. I grabbed dinner here once, and was let down. The food tastes no different from something you can make easily and cheaply at home with a microwave. I had the chicken tortellini alfredo and the mac & cheese (they have some sort of half and half option where you can pick two things). I also got a dinner roll. First thing you might notice is that the portions are SMALL. It was no where near enough food to satisfy an average adult IMO, and the price suggested larger portions. As I alluded to earlier, you could walk to County Market (5 mins), buy some premade pasta and sauce and kraft mac & cheese for about the same price, and get the same flavor, but easily twice the food or more. To top it all off, my so called dinner «roll», was nothing more than a slice of bread that they just threw in the bag (seriously, not wrapped or anything). I wouldn’t give them any more of my money.

The paninis are generally the best sandwiches to order. Overall, this place is fairly average. You get a pretty solid sandwich if you’re hungry.

This may be a concern that relates to all Panera Bread locations so keep that in mind. Generally it seems that Panera puts decent food out. My complaint is the constant implication that they are all about healthy eating when they offer a single item on the menu that is vegan and it is only sporadically on the menu. The Black Bean soup is supposed to be vegan and is the only thing — other than a small side salad or an apple — that is a vegan meal.
My issue other than the fact that there is no selection is that the Black Bean Soup is only on the menu certain days and not always reliably. Thus, it isn’t worth going in to even try the place. I raised the issue with an employee and she said they are «working on it.» That is pretty far behind the times and how hard is it to put a few more vegan items or to offer the one you have consistently? This is not generally and overall a healthy place to eat and really tries to make it look like it is. I hope someday they catch up and offer some vegan choices and more vegetarian fare also.