Benson Eating Station
“The restaurant's floor plan is a little odd, it looks like they inherited it from whatever occupied the space before.”
“Other live seafoods are also offered, they are on display in the fish tanks once you step in the door.”
Benson Eating Station
Takes Reservations: Yes
Take-out: Yes
Accepts Credit Cards: Yes
Bike Parking: Yes
Good for Kids: Yes
Good for Groups: Yes
Has TV: Yes
Waiter Service: Yes
Caters: Yes
Price range.
$$ Price range $11-30
8 reviews
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not sure why this place has such low ratings, but the dim sum here is pretty good. most of the dim sum is about average. decent shu mai and shrimp cheung fun. below average beef cheung fun. the set-up seems a little odd. but you are here to eat and it is a place where you can get a decent meal.
The Alaskan King Crab is what attracts most Chinese families to try this spot.
Now I'm not a huge fan of seafood, but everyone else in my family is. What I am a fan of is integrity and honesty.
My family reserved a table and called a few days in advance regarding to their pre-fix meal including a 5lb crab for $368.
The owner guaranteed us there would be a crab reserved for my family.
When we arrived, we were seated and ordered our dishes. Around 10 minutes after my family settled in, prepared to dig in, the owner arrives and says they dont have a 5lb crab and the smallest is a 10lb, which will be an additional $200 bucks!!!
Obviously my family was not happy about it but we were already so hungry and didn't want to move to a different location so we reluctantly agreed on paying an additional 200 bucks.
Food was like any other average chinese restaurant, service was attentive. Not happy about the dishonesty in this restaurant though. It seems like they do this quite often, luring in customers with a 5lb pre-fix meal, and then adding additional charges. Don't think i would return back nor would I recommend this place to anyone.
Called for a reservation for Saturday night for 12 people initially, but had to change it to a final count of 14 people. The manager/receptionist reassured me that they already had a table for us that will be ok. We were placed at a table that could only fit 12 people. It seems like the restaurant is only limited to 12 people tables on the main level. Another manager told us after dinner that they do have VIP rooms in the lower level that could fit up to 16people, which also includes Mahjong tables, and karaoke.
So as other people have already stated, the layout is weird. It's an L-shaped restaurant with 3 separate dining areas on the main level. You have to walk down a couple of steps to the back area of the main level. The inside of the restaurant looks very dated. The chairs were a little too low for the table. I felt like I was cramped into someone's living room.
The bathroom was disgusting. There was only two unisex bathrooms. The floor was wet-not just the toilet area, but the entire bathroom floor! There was no toilet paper, or towels; at least they had a hand dryer.
Food was okay. Their specialty is the king crab, $368 for a pre-set dinner limited to a 5lb king crab. $33 for each additional lb afterwards. Just FYI, all of the crabs in the tank looked to be over 8lbs. So be prepared to pay an additional $70-$200. The king crab that we picked was 10.75lb, which made the final bill to be quite hefty.
I wished they paced the dishes. Most of the dishes were brought out all at once, so it was annoying trying to make sure drink glasses weren't knocked over when turning the lazy Susan. Maybe the kitchen is continuously making the dishes as most of the tables ordered the pre-set dinner?
1) King crab legs and body steamed with garlic and scallions – This was yummy. Can never go wrong with garlic. This was my first time having fresh King crab. The meat was very tender. The crab legs were pre cracked, but be prepared to use your hands to deshell everything.
2) Crab roe in egg drop soup – The soup was very gloopy. I didn't taste crab.
3) Crab shell with vermicelli – The noodles were okay. Nothing special.
4) Large pan fried shrimp – Overcooked. The shells were very hard to peel off. Other then that, it tasted great.
5) Beef cube stirred fried with pineapple and snow peas – Okay. Exactly what you would expect it taste like.
6) Tofu, mushroom and snow peas stir fried – The tofu was good. There was too much corn starch in the sauce, hence the sauce was gloopy.
7) Fried and sautéed fish with celery and snow peas – See a trend here? They used snow peas for 3 of the dishes. Anyway the fish was way too salty.
8) Crispy chicken – It was good, but I felt that the chicken was very small. It looked like only half a chicken.
9) Fried rice – It was okay. Had yellow raisins.
10) Desserts: orange slices and red bean and sesame Chinese mochi cakes. The mochi was delicious and very pretty. Not too sweet.
Overall I enjoyed the crab legs. Everything else was meh. There was too much msg (I drank 4 cups of water as soon as I got home). Personally I think the restaurants main draw is the their King crab. Otherwise it would be very hard for them to survive on 86st amount competitors.
It's way worth the visit just for the live Alaskan King crab prepared 4 ways! We had ours prepared as followed: shell stirred fried with mung bean vermicelli, bodies fried with garlic ad chilis, legs steamed in egg white and wine (oh my was I in heaven!), and last but not least crab roe bisque. Even though it can be a little pricy @$38/lb but you will get every single one of your dollars worth.
Other live seafoods are also offered, they are on display in the fish tanks once you step in the door. Just explain to your server how you like them prepared, they will do everything to accommodate your request. (Sorry most seafood items are not listed on the menu). For those that are not less experienced with sea creatures, ask for advice from the server. A piece of advice if you are there for the Alaskan King crab – make sure you call ahead to reserve the crab cause they do go really fast.
Other menu items we had were out shined by the King crab 4-way but it doesn't mean they are in anyway under scored. But fresh seafood is the king here.
This is the worst Dim Sum restaurant I've ever been to. There are no system whatsoever. When it's crowded, they do give you a number, but they also just let anyone go in and take the table when the waiters are still cleaning up. If you are seated at the lower level, no cart will ever come to you. There will be one lady that brings out the food on a tray and ask around, by the time she gets to you, there will be no food on the tray, then she goes back and get more and there still wouldn't be any food left. You have to be aggressive here or you won't get any food. It's really a battle zone! We sat there for a good an hour and half and got 3 dishes of dim sum, we ended up just ordering a noodle dish from the menu. The selection of dim sum is completely lack of. They just bring you the same food, over and over again. I counted, there were maybe 7-8 dishes passed around the whole time. The service here is horrible too, the waiters never bother changing your plates, it took awhile to get anyone's attention. They are outright rude and nasty. Lastly, the food is below average. I will not return, ever.
This place has recently expanded and have a larger space on the left side of the restaurant. They also started serving dim sum in that newly renovated space early in the morning. The food selection is small but they have your dim sum basics. The quality of food is average. Particularly, the har gow is really bad. I can't even pick one up with out it sticking to the paper lining and then falling apart. The shrimps inside the har gow are also not cleaned and deveined properly. The better dishes are the chicken feet and roasted pork buns. There was also a small dead bug when I poured tea into my cup.
I think the selling point of Benson Eating Station having dim sum available is to level the demand of morning dim sum in the neighborhood. The next closest restaurant that serves dim sum around here is near Bay Parkway and there's always a wait there. So it made sense that Benson Eating Station expanded. However, the quality is very average. If you're near the nabe, don't want to wait at the other places, and don't mind average dim sum, then stop by here.
I'm surprised at the low rating of this place. . First time here and it was a pretty smooth experience. It definitely does help a lot if you have someone in your party who can speak Cantonese since that's the primary language I heard the staff use with the majority of the customers (who for the most part, were Cantonese too).
Ate dim sum and every dish was tasty. The dish that stood out the most for me were the steamed chicken feet. Instead of the usual reddish look and sweetish taste, these feet were simply steamed and seasoned lightly. This proved to be good since it wasn't too heavy or overloaded with sauce. As for the other dishes, standard choice and taste.
Tip: if you know what you want for dim sum, walk up to the cart and get it. If you don't see what you want, tell any of the wandering staff and someone will eventually get you your order. Plus, the staff was pretty attentive and got my table everything we needed without much delay.
Why 2 stars? Restaurant is not the cleanest and serves average to sub-par food. A group of 7 we ordered the 2 Vancouver Crabs, a whole flounder, sauteed water spinach, minced pork & eggplant, and a crispy chicken. There is a large wait staff and they are very attentive. Usually, the custom in a Chinese restaurant when a large group orders dinner is that they bring out the dishes as soon as they are ready starting with the specialty being one of the 1st 3 dishes. After complaining about waiting 40 minutes with no food at all, they brought the vegetables dishes we ordered. Portions sizes are decent. Our Crab Specialty dish came out last and the crab meat was bland which we found unacceptable given that they charged us $20/lb ($105). I think the main fault of this restaurant is that they have expanded next door to double the size of the restaurant to accommodate more customers, but have not expanded the capability of the kitchen. Hence, the long wait for food on a Sunday evening. We will not be back. There are plenty of other dining options for authentic Chinese food in Bensonhurst. Just yelp it!