Shawn Orell and Shanna Boone, co-workers at OrthoAcel Technologies in Miami,
enjoy a scenic lunch at Benny’s on the Beach restaurant in Lake Worth.
Tim Stepien/The Coastal Star
By Brian Biggane
Back in 1986, when the Lake Worth Pier was a lot quieter than it is today, Peter Thanopoulos and John Tsakon, both in their mid-20s, pooled their resources to open Benny’s on the Beach, one of Palm Beach County’s most unusual restaurants, on that same pier.
Thirty years and a handful of hurricanes later, Benny’s has become a South Florida landmark even as it carries on its beachside tradition under new ownership.
The trio of Jeremy Hanlon, Max Lipton and Lee Lipton, who purchased the property in 2013, undertook a monthlong celebration of Benny’s 30th anniversary throughout September, culminating in a daylong beach bash Sept. 30.
Long a breakfast and lunch spot, Benny’s has undergone significant changes since Hanlon and the father-son Lipton team took over.
Hanlon, a world-class chef who has worked at fine dining spots in New York, Chicago and Europe as well as Café Boulud at the Brazilian Court in Palm Beach, has undertaken sweeping changes, from adding dinner to expanding the menu to upgrading every aspect of the building.
“We’ve changed the menu probably six different times and our staff has almost tripled because of the things we’re doing,” Hanlon said. “We bring in everything and then do it ourselves. Everything comes in raw; we marinate it, we roast it, we shred it. The burgers are a specific blend. Everything is custom so we have our own little mixture. It’s exciting.”
Thanapoulos and Tsakon had plenty of excitement of their own in their 27-year proprietorship. Just not much of it during the summers.
“It used to be you could be closed from June to September and nobody would even know, because there was nobody there,” Thanapoulos said. “But every year it got busier, and then when Hurricane Andrew hit Miami (in 1992) a lot of people started moving up this way.”
Their biggest challenge came in 2005, when Hurricane Wilma tore up the pier, forcing them to close for three months.
“The pier was shut down for almost three years, and even after we rebuilt they had a crane come every day to work on it,” Thanapoulos said. “The crane would come every morning and we had to move everything, and then it would come back out in the evening and it would be the same thing. That went on for a year and a half.
“But we worked with the city, they helped us and we helped them, and we put it back to where it is today.”
Hanlon said the idea of owning a beachside restaurant came to him when he was working in the Spanish resort town of San Sebastian.
“It was absolutely gorgeous, and I said if I ever got an opportunity to own a restaurant that was right on the ocean I had to take it.”
That opportunity arose after Hanlon, who had become a regular on the Food Network and had visited 32 countries in a three-year stint as director of culinary and menu development for Dallas-based Carlson Restaurants, returned to the Brazilian Court and was approached by the Liptons about putting in a bid for Benny’s.
“I was like, ‘Yeah, this place has potential,’ ” Hanlon said. “I’d done all the fine dining, but this was a combination of casual dining and great-tasting food.”
Thanopoulos, who is back in the business with Eggs-Cetera Café in west Lantana, said he’s happy with what’s become of what he started.
“We were very happy with who we were selling it to,” he said. “We wanted to sell to somebody who would keep it going, not just anybody. Because that place is a landmark, and we made it that.”
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