Panera Bread

First time visiting. Went on a Friday night around 8pm; just an hour before closing (there’s a reason why I mentioned this. Read on). Easy and speedy checkout. I used the stand alone-order yourself iPad in the common area. I did not like that they were cleaning as people were ordering and still eating. It’s uncomfortable and unhygienic for that to be happening around people that are still eating. Everything else was superb.

The lettuce in the to go salad wasnt great, and for a whole salad the container was pretty empty. But lol at this giant stem they decided to keep in. Why When getting a salad not to go, i find the portion size pretty insulting for 13 dollars. The bowl can obviously be filled more, just put more greens in there. The to go portion is noticeably even smaller. They are very inconsistent with the freshness of toppings and i have thrown out a meal that had pickled red onions which were no longer red/pink, but GRAY. The soda fountain tray has not been washed in a LONG time. Ive worked in food service and I know for a fact the tray comes out and you’re supposed to wash it at the end of every day. The gunk buildup under the grate alone is enough to make me never return, unless it’s to take a picture of that nastiness. Update; they cleaned that tray which im happy to see, unfortunate that it took a bad review to get us there.

Food is really good, but expensive. The 4 versus 5 stars is only because of the cost. I highly recommend the Chipotle Chicken Avocado sandwich. Also their mac n cheese is pretty good and toddler approved. Fountain drinks are $2.50 each so make sure to get a refill before you go. Oh, and their chocolate latte is tasty (and similar to a cocoa mocha or a cafe mocha at other locations).

Ordered a tuna sandwich with Tomato Basil Miche Bread. The sandwich was great except for the fact that the bread had 2 large flakes of hardened cinnamon sugar stuck to it and just generally tasted like cinnamon. I ordered nothing with cinnamon on it and would like to give the advice that savory bread should not be stored on top of sweet breads, it did not pair well.

The restaurant was clean and the cashier who took my order was friendly and welcoming. However, when I received my chicken caesar salad, I noticed that the chicken was extremely cold almost frozen. This is not good and it is the first time I've had this experience with a Panera Bread restaurant. In Georgia, when I'd order the same chicken caesar salad, the chicken was always very tender, juicy and delicious. The chicken was never cold or almost frozen. It's unfortunate, but this experience did not meet my expectations for ordering food at Panera Bread. However, the oatmeal raisin cookie and orange scone were very good.

Very disappointed when I ordered a BLT sandwich and come to find only 1 half has any bacon, lettuce, and tomato on it. To make it worse only 1 piece of bacon on the half that had anything on it. This was at 8pm on a sat. so I don't know if it was just being lazy or if by the time I recd my order that they would be closed. Very, very poor service for what I paid. Better off going To Firehouse next time- you get what you pay for there. No stars this time for paying for for basically just 2 slices of bread.