Panera Bread — Restaurant in Town of Malta

I miss the old shortbread cookies.

Very surprised I had never reviewed this location before, given how close it is to my office, but with some new menu items on the line I had to check it off my 'to-do' list.

Ordered online using their website, going for a Chicken Roma Asiago Bagel Stack (slight customizations), a bread bowl of the Chili, and a selection of pastries. (cherry, raisin berry cookie, pecan braid, cinnamon roll, and a "tulip" cookie) Coming to a grand total of $43 after tax, tip, and rounding up for their charity. A bit steep, but to be expected given the hoity-toity nature of Panera.

Right off the bat both the 'soup' and the sandwich were amazing. The chili in the bread bowl was the way to go as the meat sauce soaked into the bread, resulting in an extra treat after I was done with the chili proper. Which was very savory, had a medium spiciness, and lots of beans. The sandwich on the other hand was meaty, the "goddess" dressing on it was refreshing, and the cheesy flavor kept me sinking my teeth into it. Best parts of the meal.

Sadly the desserts faired less so. The new cherry pastry was pretty bland and only slightly tarty from the cherries, the tulip cookie was a shortbread but lacked the buttery flavor I sought as the sugary frosting overshadowed anything, the cinnamon roll was pretty bland even after giving it a quick reheat in the oven, the pecan braid was alright but only had a scant few pecans on the top with none inside it, and of the bunch the oatmeal berry was the best. It was soft, slightly sweet, and had lots of berries. Yet even still, nothing among these desserts compared to what I recall of their OG shortbread cookie. Very sad state to see them in.

Overall I loved the main course but the desserts brought things down, resulting in only a 4/5 to...

If you've never been to Panera: It's kind of like rainy day food. Lots of warm meals and salads and coffees. The prices are steep for small portions so it's not quite a fast food experience.

For this specific Panera: The restaurant is always very clean, even the bathrooms. The reason I'm giving two stars is the staff. I used to come here every week, once a week, for lunch. And almost every time, my food came out super late, or not at all. More than once I ordered to my table, waited half my lunch break, told the staff I haven't gotten my food, and been talked down to like I lied about ordering anything. Even after showing a receipt. The almost always forget to give me a drink cup, and when I ask, I just get someone, who's either on their phone or chatting with another worker, to point to the cups and then go back to what they were doing. On rare occasions, I'll get told I "should have gotten a cup" and be asked to see my receipt. Once, my girlfriend was there while I wasn't, and I ordered her a cookie to her table. She sat there for 30 minutes and hadn't gotten it. I called the restaurant and got scolded by the manager that "she should've gotten up and gotten it herself". I stopped going after that. It's a shame because it's not a bad place to eat. Just horrible staff. They need to clean house...

So this sandwich pictured is supposed to be a stacked green goddess caprese. It was literally Burned bread Mayonnaise I am not joking, like maybe 2 tiny leaves of spinach or basil. I can't tell because it's totally obliterated Some small pieces of chicken Mozzarella Some tomato

It is not green...there's no green goddess sauce. It's SO BURNED AND DRY. I literally threw it out. It was not stacked. I've gotten this sandwich before at other paneras and it is decent. This was revolting and a total rip off. Panera stole from me today. I ordered a green goddess stacked sub and they sent me some nasty burned bread with a tiny bit of stuff and no sauce or peppadew peppers or anything else shown in the photo or description.

This is not the first time this has happened at this Panera. We've for some reason ordered a few times from here because it's the closest to our house and the food is so so or total miss. This was so bad I had to finally post. I will literally never order from this place again and am hesitant to ever order from any Panera again after this. I can't even keep requesting refunds because they flag me as fraud because it's been so many issues with this particular location. No more for me. Gross. Go to another Panera or no Panera at all and save yourself 25...