For the last few years there have been 3 or 4 Frankie n Benny’s in our area. Recently that number dropped to two. To be honest it wasn’t a surprise. The last time I visited one of their restaurants the experience was underwhelming and the quality of the food matched. I swore I would never go back. 

With the competition from other companies like Wagamama’s, Pizza Express and Zizzi’s, I’m pleased to say F&B’s have upped the ante.

A week or so ago we heard they’d unveiled a new menu which is packed with vegan options. ‘Packed’ can usually mean two or three items with sorbet for dessert.  In reality, the menu was genuinely chock full of vegan options and so was the kids menu!

There were so many things on the menu that even with a family of four we couldn’t get through every single item. We each went for a starter, main and dessert.

vegan starters

We started with a garlic bread with vegan cheese to share. Everything from the dough, to the amount of garlic oil to the cheese which was lovely. It was such a huge difference to the quality of food I’d experienced there before becoming vegan – the worst part of that previous visit was the inedible dough balls.

Another starter we shared were the vegan chicken nuggets with hot sauce. Yet again, we were blown away by the quality and found out they were from Fry’s.

I did think to myself that if the main meals were to follow the quality of starters Frankie n Benny’s might be able to make the greatest comeback of all time. 

vegan main meals

Our little one had a Vegan Pizza. She loves her pizza at home but usually doesn’t go through more than a slice or so before becoming bored. We were pleasantly surprised by the number of vegan dishes on the kids menu.

I had the ‘I Ain’t No Chicken’ Parmigana for my main course.

It was as good as any I’d had in other restaurants. I suspect it might have been waiting at the pass for the other dishes from the table being prepped as it was a little on the cold side.

The tomato sauce on the spaghetti could have been more flavourful. 

Next up was the Viva la Vegan Burger which they’re doing a strong push on. The reasons became obvious when it arrived!

We recently wrote about Marstons Pubs and their new B12 burger, so would the Frankie n Benny’s patty compete? The Viva la Vegan Burger is supposed to be just that. 

It was great, meaty just like a Big Mac. If you’ve recently gone vegan and miss a good burger, you’ll love this. The bun was of great quality and held together well with just the right amount of everything inside. 

As I mentioned earlier, our little one had the kids vegan margherita pizza. I’ve never seen her get to the end of a pizza in its entirety, ever. She loved it and ate it all. 

Overall the main meals were good, the Parmigana as I mentioned could have been better, but with Not Dogs and dairy free Macaroni Cheese on offer I don’t think this would deter us from visiting again.

desserts

By this point we were quite full but we felt we *had* to try out the desserts. There were more options to the usual sorbet which meant we had to sample them. 

One of us had the Chocolate & Raspberry Cake and the other had the Cookies and Dream Sundae. 

The Chocolate and Raspberry Cake came with Vegan Vanilla Ice Cream. It wasn’t dry which you often expect, the ice cream was lovely, too.

The Cookies and Dream Sundae was sizeable. Vegan marshmallows, crumbled cookies and Almond Dream Choc Chip ice cream were teamed up to cater for your sweet tooth.

I ended up sharing it with the little one. She loved it as much as I did!

Overall Thoughts

I feel F&B’s have really hit the jackpot with this new menu. There’s been such an improvement since my last visit. We were told there’s a new person working in food development who used to work for Pizza Express and we think it shows. 

We didn’t share what our non-vegan son ate while he was there so as to not cause offence to our readers.

There were some minor niggles during the meal but nothing that would deter us from visiting again. The sizeable menu for both adults and children, the quality of the majority of the meals and the overall amount of attention to detail for vegans was great to see. The team were also knowledgeable and enthusiastic about these new menu additions even though they weren’t vegan themselves. 

Have you tried out the menu at Frankie n Benny’s? Why don’t you share your photos and thoughts about it in our community chat room!