Bensi

So glad BENSI is gone, and BACI Ristorante Italiano reopened this beautiful place in Hampton. Enjoyed dinner last night, with our friends Julie S. Pugh and Andy Johnson at the new Baci (Kiss in Italian). The new owners Antonio (of Tuscany’s) and Jack (of Fiorello’s) will make this place an instant success. Antonio greeted us in a very courteous customer friendly way. He not only introduced himself before we were seated, but came by the table two times to insure everything was to our liking, prepared and served properly. We had a very enjoyable dinner, the service by our waiter Sonny was great. He made several suggestions that were not on the menu, and they were great recommendations. We will definitely make this new restaurant one of our favorites…

So once again we went to Bensi for dinner and this time we ordered it to go.
1^st Strike. I ordered their pasta carbonara with 6 shrimp, they charged me $ 9.00 for the extra shrimp.
2^nd Strike. They only gave me 4 out of the 6 I ordered but still charged me for all 6.
3^rd Strike. They gave us all the amenities, like bread and salad that they would if we had eaten in. Except they gave us raw bread and no oil.
So needless to say, I will make my own Carbonara and for $ 9.00 worth of shrimp, I will get half a pound, instead of 6, I mean 4.
Ridiculous!!!
One notable thing about waiting for our food, was the very nice bartender, well after he came back to the bar after 3 – 5 minute disappearing act.

Bensi has an interesting Sunday brunch buffet. For $ 20, you can choose from scrambled eggs to crepes to pasta and tons more. Even $ 2.00 mimosas or poinsettias.
Service was excellent. Our server offered us endless made-​to-​order omelettes, included in the price of the buffet, but brought to you.
I do think the buffet is overpriced for the options. I personally don’t like the idea of breakfast at an Italian restaurant. It was all sorts of random.

Service was pretty good, friendly atmosphere. The main reason this place gets a two is the quality of the food compared to price. The food lacks flavor the sauces are watery. They didn’t have everything that was on the menu available like the seltzer water. The chicken Marsala was one of the worst I have ever had. I would expect this place to serve top notch succulent dishes but they fell far too short. The chicken parmigiana was cooked to perfection and the pasta was al dente but again the dish was lacking flavor that is expected from authentic Italian restaurants.

Crazy… I’ve walked by this place several times and seeing the word Bensi I immediately think Japanese food. When I came in to meet a friend for lunch today I noticed it was an Italian restaurant. Probably my fault for not noticing but I certainly wasn’t expecting Italian today.
I walked in and was immediately greeted by the friendly staff and we took a seat at the bar since there were a few TVs to catch a glimpse of Sportscenter. Our waiter brought out some bread and their house made oilish like sauce that I thought was delicious. My reco… add some grated cheese an you’re in business.
They have a special $ 10 lunch menu with a variety of items (see pic). I ordered their salmon salad that came with sliced apples and goat cheese. I wasn’t a real big fan of their dark Italian-​like dressing and wished I didn’t pour the entire thing on my meal. A ranch or blue cheese (yes, even with goat cheese) would have done just fine. I found the salmon to be cooked well… nice texture and flavored throughout.
As for the ambiance, it’s a very upscale feel with nice décor throughout. One can go business casual, dressy but I would think twice before walking in with a tshirt, shirts and flip flops. They even have an outdoor patio area but today was just too humid.
Overall, a decent visit. With their $ 10 lunch specials I’d come back.

If this were anywhere in the west coast, they’d get 1 star. I’m adding 2 stars since this place is in Hampton, where the ‘bar’ is set so much lower.
Front desk girl nowhere to be found even though the place was near empty — twas Saturday around 6 or 7pm when we visited.
5 mins later we were taken to the ‘auditorium’, i.e. the main dining area. While most Italian places opt for a dark wood décor, this place went ‘basketball court’ with a huge arching cavernous space. It just felt weird.
Everything was clean, white sheet table cloths, etc. We didn’t have enough silverware so I had to do my standard ‘steal from the empty table next to me” to get enough.
It took too long (you know what I mean) for the server to greet us, but she was very pleasant. We were starving and had to ask for the free bread after we saw her walk by a few times.
Bottom line, it seems like a nice ‘date’ place, but the food is a very small step above olive garden in terms of quality/​presentation.
We’ll probably check out the bar for happy hour.

Had lunch with my mom at Bensi. It’s an Italian chain restaurant located in Peninsula Town Center, and as such makes for an ideal location to grab some food after shopping. It has a very elegant interior design, with wide open windows, spacious booths, and looks very upscale. The food, however, was not freshly prepared. We ended up ordering salmon and chicken. The grilled salmon was served with a manga salsa plated with vegetable and potato, which tasted like it was pre-​heated. Vegetables probably came from a can. Our chicken caprese was pan fried and served with baby arugula, grape tomatoes, and parmigiano cheese. Again, their chicken tasted like it was just heated after sitting the refrigerator. Service also was a little inattentive. My brother came a few months after me and said the same things

I came here last night for dinner with my husband. We were greeted by every employee. The costumer service was really superb. The dining area has a very classy touch with vaulted ceilings and cozy booths. It had a very intimate feel which was great because it was our first time out without our lovely toddler in a few months.
We started our love affair with food by ordering the stuffed mushrooms with crab meat. I am not a seafood person myself but they were pretty darn good. They also included a nice sample of cooked spinach and it was delicious. My entrée was the Eggplant Rollatini. It was amazing! I couldn’t finish it but it was foodgasmic! I was really surprised since eggplant can be hard to work with but now I am eager to try their other egg plant dishes since they did so well with that one. Every plate we were served had gorgeous presentation. I love it when my food looks pretty!
The only thing I can complain about is one of the bathroom sinks wasn’t working. Which is super minor!

I can only comment on the service as everytime I have attempted to dine here the service was so poor I ended up walking out. On both occasions I have been here I waited at the hostess stand (which was empty by the way) for a solid ten minutes. When the host finally arrived he did not say a word, picked up some items from the station then left again. I wait an additional 10 minutes and when he did not return I sat at the bar in hopes of placing a to-​go order and possibly have a drink while I wait for my food. I sat at the bar and waited for the bartender to finish his conversation with another patron (another 10 minutes) when I could stand being ignored no longer I cleared my throat said, «excuse me I would like to be serviced» apparently the conversation was better than my business as the bartender was not helpful and very inattentive. I asked if I could place my to-​go order at the bar he said no you have to do that with the hostess. I nearly lost it! There was no one at the hostess station abd at this point about 6 otherd diners now waiting to be seated. There was no way I was getting back in the line so I simply gathered my belongings and left. Bensi has a lot to learn about the service industry. There are so many other places to spend my money and Bensi wont see a dime of it!

This restaurant (except for the server) seemed openly contemptuous of its customers. W T F.
It’s a beautiful restaurant. It’s clean. It’s in a very nice mall in a convenient location. The server was very nice, though not particularly good at her job. And there was the first indication of the problem.
There were misspellings on the menu. I, being me, thought it was funny. I joshed with the waitress about it. She got a funny look and … apologized. Little did I know at that moment that she apologized because, apparently, as the face of Bensi to its customers, that’s what she was used to doing. And little did I know that the sloppy spelling was just a manifestation of the aggressive lack of concern and care Bensi’s management has for its customers.
There were fourteen of us. The server took drink orders. After a few minutes, she came back with ten drinks. Four weren’t available. Now, these weren’t weird drinks. My wine came from the menu. One couldn’t be made because a standard mixer wasn’t available. That kind of thing. After a reorder, two more showed up. Two needed to be reordered. wtf?
The server rattled off the specials without much explanation, as if they were of no consequence. And in the opinion of my friend across the table who got a special scallop dish, the specials were, in fact, not so special.
Fourteen orders. After several minutes, the waitress came back and informed four of us that their dishes weren’t available. Four reorders, several minutes, waitress returns with more bad news about unavailable menu items and specials. Now, this was a Wednesday night at 6:00. The restaurant was pretty empty, so it’s not as if they’d had a huge dinner rush and were still reeling from the tremendous drain on their inventory. They were out of some items because their deliveries weren’t in yet, is all. But no one cared about their customers enough to let the waitress know up front what items were available and which weren’t.
The last straw was broken spaghetti. I ordered spaghetti. I got spaghetti. I got a spoon and a fork. But I couldn’t do the wrap-​the-​pasta-​around-​the-​fork thing to save my life. I was talking to my friends, so I wasn’t really paying attention to why, but it dawned on me eventually that the spaghetti was too short to twist around my fork. OK, so I tried just picking it up with my spoon. It was too long. Being a systems engineering type and proud of it, I engineered a system that got my dinner from my plate to my mouth. I was beginning to be not so hungry. Woo-​hoo!
Then, suddenly, my spaghetti got long. No, really. I’d started manging on the food in a different place on my plate, so the spaghetti had changed. The system I’d developed for eating Bensi’s fairly-​short spaghetti no longer worked. Depending where on my plate I was eating, some was short, some was long. I was still hungry. My food was frustrating my efforts to enjoy it. And I got annoyed.
wtF! Did they really just dump the last, broken bits of spaghetti in the box into the boiling water and serve it to their customer? Did they really think that I was just there to stuff my face, no matter the condition of the food, and I wouldn’t mind spending thirty bucks for the privilege of sitting in their pretty dining room? Did they not think that giving me a spoon to wrap spaghetti with when the strands were two and a half inches long wasn’t going to show me they were just going through the motions? W T F?
I’ve never been incensed by noodles before. I don’t need to be annoyed by my food. I’m not going back.
And oh, by the way, the food wasn’t all that good, either. If you want really good Italian in a nice place prepared by people who like you and want you to be happy, go to Vineyards on Kiln Creek Parkway, about 10 or 15 minutes away. I guarantee you’ll get spaghetti you can wrap.