Panera Bread Review February 2024
I went to Panera Bread this morning! It was a 40 minute drive from my aunt's house, but in this icy, snowy Minnesota flora, it was quite beautiful to witness the sunrise. I first went to one on the north side of Rochester, but rather than open at 6am, it opened at 7am. As I arrived around 6:30am, I instead went to the Panera on the south side of Rochester (about an 8 minute drive). This one had a, uh, "modernized" sign (was simply some white text in some font I don't recognize), and the layout was a little different than your run-of-the-mill Panera Bread, but, I mean. You know what they say: a Panera Bread is a Panera Bread! What follows is excerpts of my writing as I ate my breakfast. Said writing was originally accompanied by comments from my friend Crank, who I conversed with throughout. Said conversation has been excised, but to recount, they mentioned the "preworkout lemonade", I made the incredibly funny joke "they have hobbies aside from killing people 🙄", I mentioned their bagged mac and cheese and how I love Panera, and they said "hell yeah".
Unsweet Iced Tea, an Avocado, Egg White, Spinach & Cheese on Multigrain Bagel Flat Sandwich (which oddly lacked cheese, though it's my first time having it, and thus I did not realize it was supposed to have cheese), and a Cranberry Orange Muffin 🍵🥪🍞
Their unsweet iced tea tastes slightly different from the stuff in Stilly - I'm quite sure that's from the tap water, which tastes significantly different than the stuff in Stillwater. As a sidenote, I'm now fully a plastic bottled water drinker, microplastics be damned. Can't stand the taste of the tap water at my aunt's house. Back to the tea, I'm not much of a fan this morning, though I'll likely acclimate to it with time.
The Avocado Egg White Spinach Sandwich tastes oddly bland. The multigrain bread, the egg, and the avocado combine to form a very overpowering gray taste. None of the magnificent splendor of a boiled egg can be found in this sandwich. Could use mayonnaise or salt. After the first 2 bites, I added salt, and it now pops, but it's still a very bland overall combination. The spinach and the tomato are so subtle and noncommittal to the overall flavor profile they're only distinguishable in the aftertaste. This whole thing could use some ingredient changes and some love. Pretty okay breakfast sandwich altogether though, and was moderately tasty. They should throw some fuckin' butter on this thing. Maybe actually spice the egg.
The Cranberry Muffin is a Panera Cranberry Muffin. Tangy and sugary. Copy and paste whatever I put in January's review here
The meal I had this morning was ultimately worth the 80 minute round-trip drive, as the early morning Minnesota worldsphere is beautiful. The sky is a panoply of beauty in every direction, as if you were the center guard in the Beauty Panopticon.
Posing for da camera 😎