Café Bengodi

Great place! Everything was so perfect and delicious. Our server was amazing! Had great suggestions and helped pack our leftovers. The patio is perfect for a Sunny day!

Here we are again. Three stars, and the message could not be more mixed. To be honest, this review is hard to write.
It’s hard because I really, genuinely love the food at Café Bengodi. It’s one of the few excellent Italian places in Seattle — the Caprese is bright and flavorful, and the pastas are rich and satisfying. My first time here I tried the Ciccia — sausage and Parmesan over a layer of polenta — and it was unforgettable. The garlic prawns were also delicious, and unlike anything I’ve had at other Italian restaurants. The prices are higher than average but not ridiculous, and the food quality makes it worth it.
It’s also difficult because the service is fantastic. The waiters are friendly and helpful, and they make your experience fun and memorable. Our first visit was on a mild spring evening, and we sat outside. The waiter maintained a banter with us, but also with people walking by on the sidewalk, some of whom were locals he obviously knew. The food comes out quickly, and is served on mismatched, colorful plates that somehow only adds to the fun atmosphere.
So why does this amazing place have only three stars in my review? Two reasons — they are as unfortunate as they are hard to get past. (This is the hard part.)
The first is rats. There are no rats in the restaurant, but the establishment next door has rats that run up and down the steps into the underground entrance. You will likely scare a few away if you walk down that street to get to Bengodi. It also seems to be getting worse — I lost count of how many rats I saw on the street before we went into the restaurant. It shouldn’t reflect on the place, but it does affect the experience overall.
The second happened on our second visit. We tried the Prix fixe menu and were enjoying our meal when my wife discovered a bug in her pasta. She set it on the edge of her plate and laughed it off (she’s a trooper and worked in a restaurant for a while), but it definitely cast a pall over an otherwise delightful evening.
A restaurant visit is an experience. The food, the atmosphere, the attitude of the person serving your food, and a million things that go into it. Café Bengodi has the food nailed, and the service is stellar. Which is why it saddens me to say that the issues of the rats nearby and the bug in the food detract enough from my experience that it will take me a lot to go back.
If I do, though… It might be that Ciccia that convinces me. I could go for another plate of that.

Café Bengodi is a place I love to come anytime I am in Seattle looking for authentic Italian food. My daughter and I went there today for lunch. She had the meatball sub. I had the chicken Parmesan with the Aurora sauce. My daughter says it’s the most delicious Italian food. The portions were a good size and the price was not bad. This is a very small hole in the wall café. I would highly recommend Café Bengodi to anyone looking for a delicious Italian food and a small quaint atmosphere. :-)

Unfortunately, the food was not as impressive for me. Maybe I don’t know authentic Italian food? Both my friend’s carbonara and my puttanesca just didn’t have the flavor combination we were hoping for. Hers was definitely too bland, added salt, and and it was somewhat better. Mine was fishy as expected, but overall, was just not impressive to me. The only thing we enjoyed together was the flat bread and salad appetizer. The place is VERY cozy, so don’t be surprised if you come out smelling like food.

We’ve eaten dinner here multiple times. The food is great. They do not have a wine list… just a house red or white… which is actually pretty good. The only thing i don’t like is there interior design (the booths look like they came from a 1970’s McDonalds’). Also, as this place is very small… Friday & Sat night makes it almost impossible to get in.

I am so happy the low star rating didn’t make me pass this place up, we’ll it almost did! The place I was going to try was closed. It was late Sunday night and no one was there. I went in, ordered the pasta carbonara, it was fabulous. Nice proportions, real world portions. I saved Room for tiramisu it too was good, although it could have used a few more hours to let the lady fingers soften up a bit. I know I will be spending lots of hours trying to recreate this pasta dish. As for some of the poor reviews, try it again! Everyone has an off night.

Use to be my go to place for Italian when I lived downtown. Can’t stress how much I loved this place. Consistent every visit. It had been about a year since I had been in. Ether they were having a bad night all around or it’s gone down hill.
Waitress had a cool demeanor, which was out of the norm for this place. Missing the warm casual welcome and smile. Quickly ordered and food quickly arrived.
Food wasn’t bad, but seemed everything was slightly incorrect. Salad was served near dry, normally generously tossed with a wonderfully balanced honey balsamic vinaigrette, with fresh toppings on the bed of mixed greens. I mentioned lack of dressing to the waitress when the pasta came and was brought a side of dressing to pour over the top which might have been straight vinegar. Pasta was a minute or two shy of al dente, sauce thinner and less rich. Ingredient ratios were off enough that flavors expected weren’t coming through. Peas I remembered fresh and sweet, were mealy. Portions seemed to get downsized by about 20% which is retrospect should not have been a disappointment.
Never saw the waitress again (no check) so just left cash with tip to cover my normal order.
I hope this hole in the wall place isn’t past it’s time. I’ll probably try it again and hope.

Wonderful food, with a variety of flavor blendings. Skip the heavy pasta dishes at other restaurants. Try vegetable in seafood and chicken for an amazing taste. Not fancy. Wear your jeans.

Excellent food. Excellent service. Not to be missed.

Small hole in the wall with what I consider the best Italian food in the northwest! Prove me wrong…
Another trip down and again the food was great. Found out from talking to the waiter they are part of the Pioneer Square Italian mafia but still haven’t tried their other places around the block. But if they are as good as this place I’m sure it’d be delish!

Get he carbonara. Wine: they have what they have; like it or not. The food is out of control. This place has 3.5 stars for a reason that completely escapes me. It’s not fancy. It’s just good; sorry, it’s great. It is casual, family Italian dining. I will eat here whenever I’m in Seattle.

Went here for the first time and from the beginning the Waitress accommodated us. She asked us if we wanted to take the outside table street side which looked great because it was street side and café feeling. We had a small service pet with us and she brought out for him and continued by explaining the menu. We each ordered a glass of the house Chianti which was the only hiccup in our experience. The glass pours were a lil on the short side and not evenly distributed but decent house wine $ 7? Anyway I ordered the Vongole in red sauce and my lady ordered spaghetti and meatballs with a side of Garlic bread. The dishes were spot with one thing amiss the clams were not all open. Other than that great meal and to top it off we were brought Tiramasu which was divine. We’ll be back

Food was amazing! We all love our pasta dishes. The atmosphere was a little rugged. Kind of a dive but so worth it though since none of us were disappointed in our dinner. Would definitely come back.

Went there for first time. I had the carbonara, pretty good not comparable to Italy but could use a bit more sauce so it wasn’t so dry. They are very generous with their pancetta though. No garlic bread served with my dish like previous tips that others folks shared that you see in their pictures.
Very polite service, these folks work hard. I came around the end of lunch but it was a full house.

The food here was okay, it wasn’t something that I would write home to rave about. We got there on a Monday afternoon and when we saw a wait staff we asked to be seated and was told to seat our self. It was really hot in inside the restaurant so we opted to seat outside on the patio. I had the Gamberi pasta with prawns and mandarin orange and tarragon. The sauce was good I wasn’t really too excited to see large chunks of mandarin orange. I really assumed it was part of the sauce and you will see some orange on it as part of the sauce and not large chunk of it. It was just weird to see orange in my pasta. Maybe it’s something common and I have just yet to experience it before ?
Another interesting thing I notice is that you get served the same pasta regardless of what dishes you order. It looks like they rotate the pasta of the day so everyone get the same kind of pasta when you order.
The outdoor patio sitting is really tight seating. There’s a bout four tables in the a row with the tables on the end being easily accessible but if you need to sit on the table in the middle people would have to move around to let you in. I would say this more a restaurant catered to tourist since it was located at Pioneer Square and most patron in it were tourist. Most patron had a camera, were talking about the underground ghost tours… etc.

Absolutely the best Italian food anywhere. The pasta is homemade and the sauces are fresh and delicious. It is easy to see these people are passionate about what they do.
The service is friendly and efficient with no nonsense. It is all about the food here.

This place has incredible food! If you’re looking for good Italian food, this is your spot. If you’re looking for speedy service, this may not (I’m guessing that’s how it is at 3.5*)
I got one of the sausage sandwiches and it was a truly amazing sandwich. That’s coming from a guy who has sandwich as part of his food pyramid, it’s a staple for me. This sandwich had onions, mushrooms, sausage and mozzarella on the top.
My one downfall is that they wanted to keep only Italian beer, Peroni and some amber ale. These beers are okay but we have so much more variety here it didn’t make sense to only have a couple. Food quality outweighed my inclination to give 4* because that sandwich was amazing!

I mainly rated this place 4 stars because the customer service was great! We arrived at the place with about 20 minutes into closing time. The owner said we can still eat at the restaurant, but we still ordered our food to-​go. I ordered a pasta carbonara and it was one of the better carbonara dishes I’ve had. I would come back here again.

I always get the pasta carbonara, to go. It’s simply amazing. I also get the garlic read — which I love, it’s light, buttery, garlicky, and crispy delicious.
Never dined in here, it’s small which is okay. Every time I do come here, even if it’s just to pick up my food, I always end up smelling like food. Lol nothin wrong with that, but I’m just sayin.

Bookmark PLACED ASW!
Serious tasty food! LOVED it! We happened upon this place and enjoyed our meal with our little place!
Great pasta. Great prices. Small space

Not bad for a quick lunch stop off.
The place is small but was not crowded — does this say something?
Staff was pleasant and was promptly given a menu and water.
My order was the chicken flatbread pizza that comes with a salad for $ 9
The flatbread itself had mozzerella, gorgonzola, chicken, and peppers. There was not a typical tomato sauce on it but none the less it was plenty of food, the crust was nice, and overall it wasn’t too bad. The salad… was more like a bunch of chopped mushrooms and tomatoes with a hint of actual lettuce. MEH.
I should have perhaps gone with my gut and ordered pasta but all in all the meal was OK.

This place is a hot mess. Seating for 20 or something like that. ZERO space to move, waiters bumping you constantly. Ridiculously loud fans running and kitchen is behind you clanging away. If you can get over that… or sit outside, holy hell do they have some tasty food.
We will come here again. Bookmark that shit SMW!

Solid Italian place that has its unique charms and quirks haha.
My boyfriend and I first became aware of Café Bengodi when we were browsing the list of restaurants on the passport website and decided to give it a try with the BOGO promo.
Upon arrival, I had doubts about this place, extremely mismatched decoration, dust collector décor in a sorta awkward place. And like they say, don’t judge a book by it’s covers. We both enjoyed our meals for its taste and have been back close to a dozen of times for the taste and value.
My plug for this place is the carbonara and garlic bread. Two staple items with the traditional take that are done very well. The Salmone comes in as a close second amongst the many other pastas we have tried. Hoping to try more and continue to be surprised by the offerings.
I will say though that I was disappointed by the dessert. We had the tiramisu and it tasted bland and old. It was just cold as if it’s been thawed out for the day after sitting in the fridge/​freezer for weeks.
As for the service, get the guy some help! You’ll definitely know who I’m referring to. Every time we’ve been here whether it’s a late Saturday night or an early Tuesday dinner, the same guy serves us every time I’m starting to think he lives here too. Jon, his name I believe, does the job. Nothing spectacular, but I have nothing to complain of. The place isn’t always busy but when it does, he’s the one seating, taking orders, serving, taking payments and cleaning. And with about 10 tables, every one is doing some waiting at one point or another as to be expected. As an ex-​server, I applaud him. So seriously, get him some help.