Pupuseria Dona Bessy

Really cute and affordable family owned restaurant. The service is fast and good, weekends are busier than week nights.

Disclaimer: This is a «foreigner’s» rating. Please take with a grain of salt. In fact, such a big grain salt, since I intended to go to Pupuseria Doña Azucena next door from the higher ratings, but ended up here coz all the words looked alike ^_^
Usually you can tell if a place is «authentic» when
1) [Only] People from the food’s country dine there and they look at you like a dancing cow just walked in
2) The place looks like a cafeteria
3) When you ask for a menu to go, you see a tiny smirk like «Those foreigners, always asking for a damn menu!»
That said, I ordered the cheese, cheese & bean, and cheese & squash pupusas. It was super cheap, for a total of $ 4.50! The price satisfied the Indian in me. They said it would take 10 minutes to make, and it seemed like they fired up the kitchen just for my pupusas. I felt special. They tasted yummy and fresh (kinda like Arepas but softer and better… I know, I know wrong country, calm down) and a little oily but no complaints there. The tomato sauce they gave was pretty bland, not spicy like I was expecting.
Now time to try next door!
**Update, I tried next door and I have to say I like Dona Bessy better!

Pupusas were really good. The place was packed, parking lot is way too small though. Restaurant was kind of messy.

Really poor as usually this place is. Stopped by with family on Friday night and this place was dirty all around. Tables and floor. We asked one of the servers to please clean a table for us. She did not say anything and just went to pass a dirty towel on that table leaving trash under table and some left over food on the chairs.
Verry disappointed since I come here for pupusas regularly.

I’ve never not found it weird that this place opened up RIGHT next to Doña Acuzena’s, which has been in business since I was a kid. I’ve come here twice; once to compare it to Acuzena and on Christmas evening because not even IHop was open. Neither times were particularly remarkable in terms of pupusas; tasty and cheap and did the job. This place is significantly bigger than the pupusa joint next door, and I think they did want it to seem a little more polished.
When we went this past Christmas, the ‘new’ tables were wrecked and peeled. They forgot my water after I asked twice. Our other fellow patrons had on an ankle bracelet and/​or were incredibly drunk and cursing in Spanish, stumbling between the tables.
I wouldn’t come back even with a better option next door, but luckily yeah, there is a better option next door.

Siempre pasaba a este lugar porque doña azucena es mucho mejor pero siempre está súper ocupado, por esa razón siempre pasaba a este otro. Ya no regresaré más porque nunca recibo mis órdenes exactamente como las ordenó, me da asco la gente que come ahí porque nunca usan los cubiertos, siempre usan los dedos para comer de hecho ellos no comen ellos tragan como animales y siempre hablan con la boca llena, esos centroamericanos no tienen modales ya la educación la dejamos a un lado lo único bueno eran las carnes azadas, todo el resto de su menú es una gran porqueria.

Stopped by for a ‘snack’ after hiking around Lake Accotink. They make everything to order so stopping for a snack wasn’t the smartest idea, but hey! fresh pupusas!
We ordered the cheese & cheese and pork. I loved the cheese one, gooey, salty, yum. While the cheese & pork had a satisfying amount of pork, it would have done better with more cheese and ended up being a bit greasy and bland. Our order came with a side of slaw which was extremely peppery and not particularly to my liking.

Good food at a fair price I enjoyed the tamales and the carne asada. Both were delicious Another fine ethnic Arlington restaurant. I will be back

First, let me state that I LOVE trying new places to eat. However, I had a bad experience at this place when I went here for the first, and only, time with family after church this past Sunday. Dona Bessy was almost empty and had two tables with people already served food and two people waiting for take-​out orders.
As stated by others, no the servers did not speak English; easily overcome as I speak spanish fluently. We ordered breakfast plate items… simple meals. It took almost 30 minutes to get our food. I ran out of water and so did my son. A different lady gave us our food and could not answer why it took sooo long.
I had to go and get silverware from their tray, they forgot to bring part of my spouses order, and we didn’t see our original server again until after our meal.
The food on all the breakfast plates was very bland… which was a blessing, because we knew that we would have no reason for returning to this eatery.

Solid Pupusa’s.
In one of the busiest strip malls on Glebe, this place seems to draw people from all around. I consider it a good thing to the authenticity of a place when I feel like an outsider in a place, and this place had my Wife and I feeling like foreigners in a place just a mile from our house.
We basically ordered down the line and were not disappointed. I of course indulged my sweet tooth and ordered some dessert, that was made with can syrup and something fried that was delicious. We will definitely be back, though next time we may walk because the parking lot is a nightmare.

Pupusas revueltas es muy Bueno! The food here is very good, so is the service. The food is cheap and they have the best salvadorian food in the area.

Pupusas were yummy, beef soup tasted bland. Bills were mixed up –we would have payed more… check your bill.

La comida es mui buena tienen buen servicio siempre boi acomer ahí todos los sábados muchas bendiciones

This restaurant has terrible service. The waitress’s are very nice. But they forget 1 plate of an order of platanos. And the pupusas have no flavor and when we asked for some pupusas to go they gave us the wrong flavor. Me and my family will never eat at this restaurant again for such horrible service and food.

Good service but the food has no flavor very bland. Very disappointing won’t be coming back! They need to season their food and have fresh food!

Located next door to the unimpressive Doña Azucena is the equally unimpressive Doña Bessy. With pupusas and curtido that are lacking in flavor, and pasteles that I was repulsed by, I will not be coming here again.

Doña Bessy has now become a go-​to for our family when we have no desire to cook and don’t feel like dropping a fortune at a restaurant. Certainly the best value restaurant for your money and the best pupuseria in town. The menu is not extensive but hey if you come to a pupuseria, you are here to eat pupusas, let’s be real. ;-)
The place is clean and friendly and the pupusas are great. The chicharones can be a hit or miss, sometimes cooked to perfection, sometimes really burnt and dried. Don’t forget to order a side of plantains they are magically delicious there.
The front staff is not always fluent in English and sometimes you can see a panic look on their face when your gringo-​self shows up at the counter. But not to worry, they have conveniently placed monitors showing pictures of the food you can order, and if you don’t speak Spanish you can just point at the items you desire to order and the front girls could not be friendlier at helping you in the process.
In summary, if you are in the mood for great Salvadorean food at a great price, Doña Bessy is the place to go in Arlington.

Las sopas de este lugar nunca son frescas parese ser qe la hasen una ves por semana orrible y la carne azada parese frita

Here at Doña Bessy after an hour of waiting for our Pupusas to be serve, maybe they’ll notice us after writing this review. Getting full with my second drink. Smh

I can see why my father suggested this place for lunch today!
The menu isn’t extensive, but it has a great variety of dishes to offer. We came in for the pupusas, and stuck with our original appetizing idea. I made sure to try four different types of pupusas to try what it mainly had to offer. The chicharron in the pupusas was not exactly what I thought, however, it still was super delicious. I love the cheese the use for their pupusas as well as the beans. The pupusas were delicious, and definitely no complaints. One complaint I do have is the side of rice they serve. It isn’t anything special and it was missing good flavor to it.
This place is a very reasonable and fairly well priced place. In other words, this place is cheap. Food that is not pricey that’s pretty delicious? Yeah hard to beat in this area

I love this place it’s very organize and also the service is the best what can I say this place is awesome it’s clean the food is great and best of all the customer service is awesome I give them a 5 star if I can give more I would. I totally recommend this place for my family and friends I’m not even Salvadoran but the food is great and also the cheesecake is on point love love this place !!!

All I had was the loroco pupusa and the tamale but neither was as good as what I get next door. Doubt I’ll be back since, well, it seems there is a better place next door.

So a new pupusería opens up to rival Doña Azucena, right next to Doña Azucena! (I wonder what the Doña thinks of that!). Brightly lit, new, and clean, I tried it out. Good pupusas, slightly cheaper than those next door. The pupusas de loroco are really good. I enjoyed the rice pupusas more than the corn ones, but that may just be personal preference. Some of the pupusas were really thick on masa though, especially around the edges, so they still have plenty of room for improvement.
There’s WiFi, but apparently it’s private just for them. Bummer.
Friendly staff.
Have a pupusa party and try the pupusas here as well as the pupusas next door and see what you like best.
It’ll definitely be interesting to what will happen between these very similar two restaurants in the future.
Worth a try.