Being a teenager in Dartmouth, Panera Bread is a main staple of our diet. Located outside the Dartmouth Mall, Panera Bread has food that can warm you up, such as their soups, and foods that can cool you down, like a crisp salad.

One of the most favorable food items that Panera has to offer is their creamy mac and cheese. There’s just something about the gooey cheese and pasta shells that draws people in – including me. When I am on my hour lunch break from working at Old Navy, I take a walk down to Panera and order a bowl of mac and cheese and a lemonade.

When you order something, they ask what you’d like on the side. An apple, a chunk of bread, and a bag of potato chips are your choices.

Usually, I choose the chunk of bread to add to my carb feast. One afternoon while I was at Panera ordering my mac and cheese, I chose bread as my side, but when I asked for the bread the cashier’s response was, “Sorry, but we are all out of bread.”

I was stunned. The restaurant has the word bread in it, and it failed to actually have bread. Oh, the irony.

Many people also enjoy foods such as paninis, soups, salads, and regular sandwiches. Panera is part-bakery, so with the purchasing of the You-Pick-2 meal, in which you select two different food items such as half a sandwich with half a salad or a cup of soup, you can get any treat you want from the bakery for just 99 cents.

Some of the popular items at Panera are the chipotle chicken panini, the broccoli and cheddar soup, the strawberry poppyseed salad, and the Mediterranean tomato and basil sandwich. Not to mention the delicious chocolate croissants the bakery has to offer.

Panera Bread is a nice establishment where people can go to hold meetings and study groups, almost like a hip coffee cafe, and somewhere where you can hangout with friends.

Once while studying and preparing for a huge test in AP Literature, my whole class met up at Panera and took over two whole tables while we sat there for two hours cramming for a test. It’s safe to say we may have annoyed a few other customers who were sitting and quietly sipping their coffee, but we got our work done and had a nice bite to eat in the process.

Though the food at Panera is not the most amazing food I have ever had in my life (besides the mac and cheese), the environment of the restaurant is what draws me in and makes me wants to go back for another bowl of mac and cheese and a refreshing cup of lemonade.