Bencotto Italian Kitchen

Absolutely incredible food! We came down from LA specifically for the gnocchi neri and it didn't disappoint. Great service, good sized portions, and the best pasta around. Don't skip Bencotto

Everything was fantastic!! We ordered many different items to try them and nothing disappointed. Portion were substantial and enough to share. Can’t wait for the next trip to San Diego to visit again and try some other items.

Our new favorite restaurant! Try the special house aperitif "Positivo" when it is released in bottles!

Great food and service as usual here.
Do wish they had better wine selections. Waiter let us try 3 before we ordered, but none were great.
Most of the reds were dry and sour for our taste.

Everything was going well until the service began picking up without asking if we were finished eating.

Dasha was our server. She was excellent. Attended to us just when we needed. Her server helper was very attentive to every table including ours. Great experience

Black ink gnocchi with shrimp was awful, shrimp was fishy smelling and tasted worst. Lasagna was decent but over priced. Caesar salad was dry and not flavorful. Way too many other options in the area to ever go back.

Work lunch

I love this place. The manager Vanessa was awesome for taking care of us while our server wasn't able to right away. And the busser named Justin was phenomenal. He was very helpful and friendly, My husband and I will definitely be back! We will be bringing our boys here next time. The food was very delicious 😋 Thank you Vanessa and Justin. You guys are amazing.

Was in San Diego for a few days and decided to try this place for dinner on a Tuesday night. Ambiance is good. They have downstairs and upstairs inside dining areas as well as an outdoor covered patio area. We sat upstairs which was perfect. Very quiet up there so easy to talk and hear. Thought their prices were very reasonable for such good and interesting food. We tried a lot of different menu items and all was great. Their pasta is handmade and very fresh and cooked as true Italian pasta should be which is al dente as you would get in Italy. If you are looking for overcooked regular pasta you are better off at a pretend Italian chain restaurant like Olive Garden. You won’t find that horrible wanna be Italian food here! Highly recommend this place for true Italian food and a nice ambience.

I thought this restaurant was absolutely beautiful overlooking the water in the city of San Diego. My boyfriend had the shrimp that he loved and I had they are special fish dish. Rather than havingThe asparagus that came with the dish I ordered an artichoke. That was the only thing that I was disappointed in for the price there was very little meat on it. But the waiter was kind enough to take it off of our bill. If I am ever on the island of Coronado gun I will definitely revisit this place.

The waiter was very attentive and kind. Gave good dish suggestions, it was our first time dining here. We loved the cheese wheel dish, delicious and we got to experience them making it. Would recommend this place to anyone. Make sure you make a reservation to make your and the staffs life easier!

Amazing as always! Staff, atmosphere, and food keep us coming back.

My friend and I were visiting San Diego for his bday. He loves Italian and saw that Bencotto had great reviews and a good menu.

We arrived just in time for our reservation and got seated right away. The server came over about 10 minutes after we were seated and asked if we wanted drinks. We were never given a drink menu, so asked for it. He seemed immediately annoyed and said “I guess I can get that for you.” And then returned 5 minutes later. We ordered a couple of drinks, appetizers, our entrees and a dessert. The food was excellent, but that’s where it ended.

The service was poor, especially in comparison to what you’d expect for the prices. Our server had no energy, and seemed to lack knowledge of the menu. We were looking for a nice, relaxed sit down meal for my friend’s birthday - maybe 1.5-2 hours. Instead we were rushed through the meal and each dish came out quickly after the last. The server rarely came by and we were often left without water for long periods of time. We ordered tiramisu for dessert and they brought it out with no silverware to eat it with. The last straw for me is when they gave us a bill with an incorrect amount, and then charged me more without saying anything first.

All in all, even though the food was great, I would not return and would not recommend this restaurant to anyone who wants an enjoyable meal.

Food was fantastic and service was great. Restaurant also had good energy and felt very lively on a Saturday night. Would recommend

Great place. Sat out on the extended patio/deck. Loved our waiter. All staff was VERY attentive in the best way possible. 10/10 would recommend!

Love love love!! 🙌🏼🙌🏼

The place was absolutely amazing! We were taken care of by Marshall one of the newer team members and he was absolutely amazing! He gave us amazing recommendations for drinks and food! Everything was immaculate! We were also taken care of my Sergio their bartender who was also incredible! The food runner hunter! Was so kind and had a wonderful personality and didn’t make us feel bad for asking for anything! Lastly their manager Stephano was so kind, so bubbly, soo awesome! He chatted with us, he was authentic! He was visibly kind to the servers and assistant servers! I would come back here a million times over for their quality service, great aesthetics, and top notch food!

Cocktails were very good and food was amazing. Lots of outdoor seating. The lamb was phenomenal!

I loved the ambience and the service. Super polite and attentive crew. We ordered their pasta in homemade sauce and first bite itself was heaven. For dessert, josh recommended Tiramisu and that was a decision we will never regret. So good .

Food was delicious and service was great!

Our waiter was amazing. He was on top of everything refills anything we needed. The food i cant even begin to stress how fresh and delicious it was

Wonderful evening in Little Italy! Outdoor dining was very comfortable with the heaters. The seating was elegant and classy. Waiter was attentive and helpful without being overbearing. The food was good. Fresh pasta, delicious sauces and great wine!

It was my wife and daughter's birthday so we wanted to celebrate at a nice restaurant. Never been to Bencotto Italian Kitchen before but it had great reviews! All 4 of us absolute agree, this Italian Restaurant provided exceptional meals, service and ambience. The reservation was honored within minutes, no wait time. We had 2 appetizers that we shared, Calamari and Fiori di Zucca Ripieni, the Calamari was a little tough but not bad, the rest was great. Ordered 2 glasses of wine and a beer, both good. The meals were, TAGLIATELLE AL RAGU’ DI AGNELLO, TAGLIATELLE with FORMAGGI and Chicken, and 2 TORTELLI DI MAGRO with FORMAGGI. When i made the reservation I mentioned it was for a b'day celebration and I would like a special dessert, albeit a simple tiramisu they garnished both with a candle. We would definitely come back. We thoroughly enjoyed the evening!

The food was delicious and we are still talking about it. Can’t wait to go back.

Great Italian restaurant in the middle of little Italy. Enjoyed the well designed patio area as a great backdrop for great pasta. Would recommend.

Meatballs were overdone/crunchy

Delicious food, attentive service, ample patio seating. Great experience!

Pasta was boiled to death and drowned in sauce. I sent that back and they brought me lasagna. It was like soup. Literally like soup. I thought lasagna was three dimensional. Iced tea was out of the bar gun. Yuck.

The wait staff was drop dead gorgeous so we tipped well.

I have been here several times and the food is always very tasty and fresh. With outdoor seating you sometimes, as a party of 2, get seated right next to the sidewalk and the atmosphere is not the best for a nice dinner. If I am eating tacos get it and understand covid has pushed this type of seating to stay open,etc. Service was strong to start and the server was very nice however at the end we got less to no attention which lead to us to skip dessert and another drink that we usually get. Service is always good here this was a blip at the end of the visit. Would recommend.

We love this place!! Definitely get the prosciutto and fried dough and the cheese wheel pasta!

Our server was outstanding. There were some good choices for a gluten-free meal.

Wait staff and manager were very attentive to our needs. Delicious food!

Hello. ...

This will unfortunately not be the review I was hoping it would be. The reviews did not match our experience in the least.

We were celebrating my boyfriends birthday, who is an Italian from Italy. Based on reviews we chose Bencotto for his celebration.

Not one Italian in sight working there, and I mean, not one.

The waiter was meh. He wasn’t informed well of items on the menu and it was apparent that he wasn’t passionate about his job or food in general. Nice enough guy, but that’s where it ends.

The antipasto appetizer plate was good and we enjoyed it.

I ordered the Osso Bucco and was truly looking forward to it as it’s been forever since I have had this dish. When it arrived, we looked at the dish and then each other in a perplexed state. It looked and tasted like something just pulled from a microwave dinner. I mentioned to the waiter. Based on the recommendation from our waiter, my boyfriend ordered the gnocchi with Bolognese sauce. What showed up were raviolis, not gnocchi. Once again, it tasted terrible. The manager came over and apologized and removed both entrees from our bill. This was appreciated, albeit expected. He offered us a complimentary dessert, but we just wanted to leave. We did order a delicious wine and it was enjoyed with our antipasto of meats and cheeses, so not all was lost.

Three weeks ago I stopped in for a quick lunch as I was running early for a meeting. I love octopus and ordered it. It smelled fishy and was dry. I have had this dish more times than I can count at other restaurants and never been this bad. I gave them a pass as I wanted to think it was just a bad day. Not. I should have stuck to my gut.

This restaurant is not for foodies or a nice dining experience.

Horrible experience food was mediocre & the server never came back with our $30 change just assumed it was her tip

The service by far was a huge disappointment. The food came to the table extremely fast with our entree following the two apps within minutes apart. The wait staff was unfriendly and pressuring to clear dishes from the table when we weren't finished. The food presentation was sloppy. The octopus tasted fishy and just a bit off. The meatballs were not flavorful and tasted off the shelf. The black squid ink pasta with shrimp and tomato cream sauce was salty and lacked richness. The shrimp had the shells still intact which added no flavor benefit and proved challenging to eat. Overall, this experience was not worth the ~$80 and disappointing.

No too fair of a review. We ate too much at lunch and only ordered apps and dessert. The aged cheese and prosciutto was good. Panacotta was okay, not great. The service was outstanding but we were seated in a little upstairs alcove....not my fav.

Delicious pasta! Lots of choices to customize your meal. Decent wine list. Excellent service

Absolutely love this place and definitely going back to try even more of their tasty homemade pastas! The squid ink gnocchi was incredible!!

love the new out door dining