Panera Bread

My mom and I recently went for lunch at Panera. She doesn’t go there often and the bread on the sandwich she chose is on the crunchier side. The bread was fine but she just didn’t like it. I told her that is the bread that sandwich is made with. She just wasn’t happy. I was going to swap out my bread for hers but someone at the next table came over and asked what was wrong since she worked there. My mom explained and the women said not to worry and they’d make a new sandwich in whatever bread she wanted. The woman gave her a few samples and my mom chose one. She had a new sandwich made and my mom was delighted. I love that without even asking, she took the initiative and came over to make my mom happy. It was fantastic!

It's not bad, Turkey Brava and tomato soup. I really like the sauce on the sandwich. If you like thick tomato soup (similar to pizza sauce) you will probably like this. I would suggest adding a little pepper and maybe some Tabasco.

Food is fantastic. But the fact that my coffee was missed with my lunch order. And then was the wrong size even with the order was stuck to it was annoying. The woman told me I got what I paid for. She needs to study the sizes. I get the same thing all the time. It wasn't the right size, and didn't match up with what was on the receipt. Even when I showed her. Granted they were very busy, I did point it out and was told I'm wrong. The customer isn't always right.. but, I certainly was.

The prices just aren’t justified. You can get a 12 oz creamy tomato soup from here for $9, or for the same price whole foods carries a 24 oz tomato soup for $8.59, so double the amount of food for the same price? They’re also annoyingly always out of the free french baguette side. Forcing you to take chips/apple or pay for more bread on top of their high price. Quality of food also differs from place to place, the stuff I had in Boston was much better than here.

Place an order at the self-checkout this evening. I waited 37 minutes for my food. The lady behind the counter was holding it down. Seemed to be by herself. I didn't catch her name but I'd like to give her a shout out. She was so thorough I knew I didn't need to check my bag before leaving. Unfortunately she did deal with many comments from other humans impatiently waiting. She made Panera look good regardless of their shortcomings this evening. She definitely deserves a free dinner this evening.