This Is What Makes Panera Bread's Mac And Cheese So Creamy

Mac and cheese has one job: to give you an excuse to eat forkfuls of rich, creamy cheese. Panera Bread's version would have ranked higher on our list of top fast food mac and cheeses if it was more consistent. When it's done well, though, it's unmistakably creamy and delicious. How does the chain do it? Does it have a secret mac n cheese ingredient? Surprisingly, that's not the case — Panera just finds every way it can to add milk, butter, and cheese.

The ingredients to its mac and cheese sauce start with the usual –- cheddar cheese, cream, and milk are among the first listed. Panera then gets creative with new ways to pack in the creaminess with concentrated skim milk, whey, skim milk, and butter. Concentrated skim milk and regular skim milk! That's a lot, but that's not the end of it, because the restaurant goes all-in with the decadence. The recipe also includes whey protein concentrate, milk fat, cream powder, and milk protein concentrate. Surely, that must be it, right? Not quite, as there's one last ingredient to top it off –- dried cream!

Let's be honest — you don't choose mac and cheese for its health benefits, you choose it for its taste benefits. Panera's mac and cheese is a hefty meal on its own and comes in three sizes: a cup (480 calories), a bowl (960 calories), and — for the truly adventurous — a bread bowl (1150). The chain revamped its menu in 2024 to add a bacon mac and cheese option, which comes in the same sizes with a whopping 530 calories for a cup, 1,060 calories for a bowl, and 1,200 for a bread bowl. Both regular and bacon mac and cheese are pretty high in protein, however, with 32 grams in a bowl of the regular and 37 grams in the same size version with bacon.

Both items are also high in sodium. The FDA recommends people 14 years old and older eat less than 2,300 mg of sodium per day. A bowl of Panera's plain mac and cheese supplies your entire day's worth of sodium with 2,300 mg. Adding bacon to the same size mac and cheese takes you 380 mg of sodium over the daily recommendation. 

If you're looking to eat healthy at Panera, you'll have to stick to some of the salads. While options like the Greek salad and Asian sesame salad still contain over 1,000 mg of sodium, the balsamic greens with grains salad has 760 mg. On the other hand, when you're craving the creamiest mac and cheese around, a salad just isn't going to satisfy!