Bennie’s Italian Foods

Great Italian food for a reasonable price. Very nice old world ambiance. This place isn’t a $ 50 sit down restaurant so don’t expect cloth napkins or miracle dishes. This place has been in Marion for many years for a reason! The food is great and the service is quick. Large area for seating but can incur a wait around dinner on the weekends. I’ve eaten here hundreds of times and never had a bad thing to say. I’ve had one order messed up and it was quickly fixed. Order the toasted ravioli and house salad with Benny’s dressing. Beer is served in limited variety.

Great service and fancy place and this is the first time we’ve been to the restaurant. The restaurant across the street was a gambling place and you haft to be 21 and older

This place is mediocre at best. The pasta sauces taste like something out of a can. The sauces are extremely bland and definitely lack in flavor. The noodles are normally very mushy. The garlic bread is just standard, frozen garlic bread that you could purchase at Walmart.
This is not an authentic Italian restaurant. If you want real, authentic Italian then you need to travel further north. The décor is outdated and I don’t recommend this restaurant at all.

I visited Bennie’s with my cousin who considers it one of her favorite restaurants in Marion. Overall the experience was fine but nothing memorable or special.
The décor is a bit dated but the restaurant appeared clean and the wait staff was friendly and attentive. I usually order eggplant parm at Italian restaurants but Bennie’s does not have this as a regular menu item. The waitress told me it is sometimes a special and very popular but it was not available that day.
I ordered the baked lasagna with a lettuce side salad tossed with their garlic dressing. The dressing is full of garlic, which I liked, but the salad was overdressed with too much of it. The lasagna tasted fine but was nothing special. I’ve had better lasagna elsewhere. The entrée came with garlic bread, which tasted fine but reminded me of frozen garlic bread my mom used to make at home.
Food-​wise, I would probably not go back to Bennie’s on my own as there are better restaurants in Marion but I will go back with my cousin since she enjoys it so much and the food is OK enough to eat there again.

I don’t know which was worse the no EGGPLANT ordeal or them only having pink lemonade.

First of all no eggplant parm? Cmon how do you call yourself an Italian restaurant with no eggplant. Anyway got the chicken parm sandwich and it was dry with not much marinara sauce lathered on. I would give it a ⁶⁄₁₀ rating. Portions do not add up to the prices either, definitely not coming back to this place in the future.

Kind of expensive for the portion sizes. Service isn’t that great either. I had the personal pizza. It was extremely small for an entrée… not enough to be considered a shareable appetizer. For $ 9, I expected more. It was a tad on the burnt side and it was hard to find a waitress… could never order more because my server was MIA most of the night. Left hungry.

I am from Marion and I eat here often. Great baked pasta dishes & a wonderful Italian sausage sandwich. Their house garlic dressing is the best I’ve had.

Ordered toasted ravioli for appetizer and it was great!
My family all ordered Italian beef specials. Comes with salad fries and sandwich… Lots of food. Very pleased with the Italian beef!
My family loved the homemade dressing.

Not bad but not great. Setting is boring. But cheap prices at lunch time. Had a turkey club crossiant sandwich with fries. Good portions but the crossiant had to much butter on it when it was toasted. Cutomer service was good. Not on my list of places to return too. I asked the waitress about the price and she told me one thing but the bill said something else.

This was our 1^st experience at Bennie’s. A company I worked for put on a banquet in the upstairs level. The place was very clean, the waitresses were very nice and polite and the food was great. Looking forward to getting back down there sometime in the near future! Thanks for a great meal!!!

Good food and great service. The Shrimp Alfredo is absolutely delicious. The hostess was personable and reflected well on my experience. The place was full of families and the service was fast and courteous. I will be back again and again.

Consistently disappointing. Every time I eat here, I think it will be better than before. I have dined maybe five times and have never been impressed. However, the garlic salad is good and so are the tamales.

I want to start by saying I am a very picky eater and I do not like most Italian.
BUT I love Bennies… the meat sauce makes me want to slap my mother and the meatballs ohh man are they good.
That’s all you need to know about Bennies to have a good meal order the meat sauce on your food and make sure to get 2 meatballs minimum !!

This restaurant is a must visit when in Marion. The bennie’s salad is yummy! If you go on a date you must each eat the salad because the garlic is a living being! This restaurant began when a man named Bennie rolled his cart and sold hot tamales back in the 1950s. Try a salad and tamale I promise you will go back!

Decent italian. Side salad is small and side of bread is just standard frozen bread that’s been reheated. Had the tortellini and for the price got a decent portion. Tasted great and the sauce was a-​okay. Lots of selection in my opinion.
Inside and décor could use some updating.

My boyfriend & I came to Benny’s for the first time a couple weeks ago while we were staying on lake of egypt for a few nights. The atmosphere was decent, staff was very friendly, and food was good! We really enjoyed the fried ravioli (must have) and we split the tortellini with meat sauce… the sauce was KILLER! My boyfriend likes the more sweeter sauce & I prefer more of the saucey flavor. So it was a great combination of the two! Very good!

Went to Bennie’s with a group of 6 for a sponsored dinner and the whole experience was great! Even though our meal was on the house, no stone was left unturned! I had the cheese raviolis (not branching out, I know) but they tasted very fresh and the cheese was very creamy! A+! Also had a lettuce salad with the Bennie’s No Garlic Dressing — I like garlic, but was a little nervous of how garlicy it would be — and the no garlic dressing was goo, but lacked something… maybe it was garlic? I thought the service was wonderful and it was a neat little restaurant! I will definitely dine again at Bennie’s…and I WILL try the Bennie’s Garlic Dressing!

If you love garlic you need to try their special house garlic dressing. I do not live in the area so anytime I come into town Bennie’s is a must to stop at. Their pasta is great the staff is super friendly. I will be smelling like garlic for the rest of the day :)

I’m not sure why everyone in Southern Illinois is so fanatical about Bennie’s. Husband and I tried this place when we moved here on numerous recommendations and were surprised at how expensive the food was considering the lackluster taste and especially the fast-​food presentation.
The lights and decorations are nice but the booths are cheap and for $ 7 or $ 8, I expected bread with my spinach and artichoke dip, not stale chips in a plastic bowl?
Needless to say, we’ve not been back.