Panera Bread at Pembroke in Virginia Beach

The wife and I took the little poop maker to Panera Bread at Pembroke in Virginia Beach yesterday for some lunch.

It sure wasn’t my first choice, but the wife wanted their tuna salad sandwich real, real bad.  I couldn’t argue so we headed to the place that specializes in serving the youth-grunge-yuppie-wannabe crowd.

Great.  Just great.

It was warm and rainy, more like a day in April, not a day in mid November.

The boy was fantastic, cute, very well behaved and entertaining to boot.

There was no wait and the order taker was fine.  I ordered the smoked ham and swiss on rye, but they were out of rye.  That sucked.  As I mentioned, the wife wanted the tuna salad sandwich so she ordered that with chips and lemonade.  We both asked for French bread.

Our food was ready fast.  Mexican fast!  We hadn’t even sat down when the little vibrating light show on the table went off alerting us to our waiting meals.

I finished settling the boy in the chair while the wife got the grub.  Chips with one, Baked Lays with the other.  WTF?!?!  Baked Lays!  I don’t want no stinkin’ Baked Lays.  I returned the error but they wouldn’t take it back.  “But I don’t want them.” 

“We can’t take them back, but here’s the correct chips.”  WOW!  They gave me the right stuff AND let me keep the stinkin’ Lays.  Well, I can’t really complain about that, now can I?

But here’s something I can complain about and why I didn’t want to go there in the first place.  Panera is a bread place that tries to be a sandwich shop.  When I have to pay for a sandwich I want a real sandwich.  I want a big happy pile of meat between two little pieces of bread, not a couple of slices of meat and two giant slices of bread.  I hate that.

And the French bread wasn’t really all that good.  Oh sure it was fresh and tasty, but it was sticky.  It stuck to my teeth, my gums and the roof of my mouth.  One bite equals two swigs of the swill I was drinking plus some gum smacking and sucking to clear everything out.  I’m sure I was a joy to watch eating.  At least we had the adorable one boy party show with us to distract people.

Overall the place is ok if you don’t mind sitting around with a bunch of granolas chewing their bread, sipping their coffee, and playing important games of solitaire on their computers while you try to clear your teeth of sticky fresh bread all the while wondering “Where’s the beef?”

If you want bread, go to Panera, or better yet, go to a locally owned bakery.  If you want a sandwich, go to a sandwich shop.  Go to a place that knows how to pile on the meat between two itsy-bitsy pieces of bread.  Go to a place that screams, “Here’s the meat!”