This woman was looking forward to digging into her Panera bagel—until she realized what they gave her was inedible.
Panera is a bakery and cafe chain with more than 2,000 locations across the United States and Canada. It’s known for its menu of sandwiches, soups, salads, and baked treats.
The chain is a bit polarizing. Some like the cozy, simple menu, and others compare it to hospital food. To each their own.
Panera was thrust into the spotlight over the last year as people became increasingly concerned about its charged lemonades, which many people were unaware that they were loaded with caffeine.
For context, a 20 oz charged lemonade from Panera is equivalent to almost two and a half Red Bulls or nearly three cups of coffee. Panera has since eliminated the controversial drink from its menu after it led to two deaths, irreversible health complications, and three separate lawsuits.
While the Panera controversy has quieted, people are still taking to social media to call out the brand for bad customer service and food quality.
A bagel that bites back
In a trending TikTok with more than 40,000 views, Jessica (@jmettaa) shares her disappointing experience at Panera.
“Pretty sure they gave me a display bagel,” the text overlay on the video reads.
Many food places have food out on display for customers to visualize what they might order. Sometimes they’re hyper-realistic plastic recreations, other times they just sacrifice an item for that day (which would go stale after sitting out that long).
In her video, Jessica says she thinks she ended up with a bagel that wasn’t actually meant to be served to customers.
“I wish I was lying,” Jessica says.
She takes the bagel out of its baggy and bangs it on her kitchen counter. It sounds like it is hard as a rock.
Jessica tries to split it in half with her hands, but despite all her might, Jessica struggles. Once it starts to open, you can hear a cracking noise that isn’t typical for soft, fresh bagels.
“Honestly wasn’t that big of a deal just thought it was hilarious how rock hard the bagel was lol. I think it’s sad how downhill so many franchises have went and how it actually used to have some decent food back in the day,” Jessica said in an Instagram direct message.
“I wasn’t mad or anything just couldn’t believe how hard the bagel was haha i was like am i being pranked.”
Commenters react
“Everytime i get panera bagels i feel like im eating thru cement,” a person said.
“I worked at Arby’s in high school and accidentally served the display dessert to a customer,” another confessed.
“Everything has gone down hill big time at many locations in our area too. We don’t go there anymore,” a commenter wrote.
“The struggle to break it is killing me,” a viewer added.
What’s new with Panera?
Earlier this year, Panera did a big rollout of its “biggest menu transformation in brand history.” The change brought nine new menu items and 12 “enhanced classics.”
But Panera didn’t heavily publicize that they’d allegedly be getting rid of several menu items, including the flatbreads, grain bowls, and several bakery items like the butter croissant and kitchen sink cookie, Nation’s Restaurant News reported.
On top of that, a few years ago, Panera switched from making in-house freshly baked bread and bakery items, to par-baked (partially baked), and eventually to frozen.
Bakers who used to work 8- to 12-hour days were now getting two to four hours, so they quit or were laid off as Panera’s model changed.
The Daily Dot reached out to Jessica for comment via Instagram and TikTok direct message and to Panera via email.
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