Tuesday, August 17, 2004

Chicken Caesar Review: Atlanta Bread Company

The Atlanta Bread Company is roughly the same type of Bakery/Cafe/Sandwich shop that Panera is. They would have to do a lot to measure up to Panera's salad, though. Their Caesar Salad contains romaine lettuce, Parmesan cheese, croutons, their special Caesar dressing and is complemented by a dinner roll. The salad costs $4.69 and Chicken can be added to it for another $1.20, making the total $5.89 for the entire salad.

Due to time constraints, I had to get this salad to go. When I got it home, I found it was not tossed and the dressing was in two plastic containers. I'll give the place the benefit of the doubt and assume they normally toss it for people who dine in. The dressing, of which there was plenty, is their own recipe and is more oily than creamy. However, it did spread well and was tangy with a hint of sweetness. The lettuce was fresh but cut into large pieces. The bowl that it came in, however, was very deep, and allowed for an easy tossing of the salad. The croutons were good, but it felt as if there may have been some hard seeds inside them. This would be form the bread they used, I imagine. The chicken, being an addition to the salad instead of a component, was nothing special and was sparse. Most disappointing was the dinner roll that came with it. Being a bakery like Panera, I expected the bread to be fresh. Instead, it was hard as a rock and not very flavorful.

This place has nothing on Panera, and needs to work on their salads (and, sadly, their bread as well) if they ever wish to compete.

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