Wizards of Waverly Place’s David Henrie Dishes on a ‘Great Dinner’ with Selena Gomez and Boyfriend Benny Blanco

Selena Gomez’s Wizards of Waverly Place on-screen brother David Henrie gave his stamp of approval to Gomez’s boyfriend, Benny Blanco.

Henrie, 35, and wife Maria Cahill joined Gomez, 32, and Blanco (real name Benjamin Joseph Levin) for a “great dinner” of Italian food as their first meeting.

“He can order good food. He can order very good food,” Henrie recently told E! News of the renowned music producer. But Blanco, 36, has also developed quite a culinary reputation, from creating mouthwatering meals for friends and family to the release of his previous cooking shows like Eat Out America and his debut cookbook, Open Wide: A Cookbook for Friends.

“He’s super funny. I was cracking up the whole time,” Henrie said, adding that Blanco is “such a nice guy.”

“I trust Selena, and I want her to be very happy,” the How I Met Your Mother alum confessed. “She knows I have her back.”

Although they met as teens playing siblings Justin and Alex Russo on Wizards of Waverly Place, Gomez and Henrie’s relationship has evolved as they’ve grown older, he said.

“It was more big brother growing up, but now we’re all kind of equals,” he told E! News.

The actor revealed that the sibling dynamic audiences can sense while watching the show is the same off-camera. “We really did care about one another,” he said. “I think it’s a wonderful culture to have each other’s backs, to have an openness. It’s been wonderful.” 

“Selena and I remained very good friends from the end of the show, and I got married, she became good friends with my wife, and we would just all get together and have a glass of wine and just talk about memories,” he previously told PEOPLE.

“Her and my wife actually get along very well. They have woman-to-woman conversations and I just chime in with a joke or something,” he told E! News.

“Despite all of her massive successes, her and I, our relationship has just withstood all that because I don’t know, we’re just real with each other,” Henrie told PEOPLE.

“We both were close before any of that stuff started. She knows I’m going to be myself with her, and I’m going to be genuine and authentic and shoot her straight,” he continued. “I think there’s a freedom to that that is tough to come by.”

The pair have taken their off-screen friendship back on screen with the new sequel series, Wizards Beyond Waverly Place. Justin Russo (Henrie) is now living a normal life outside of the Wizard World. But, a new challenge surfaces when his sister Alex Russo (Gomez) introduces him to Billie (Janice LeAnn Brown), a young wizard in need of Justin’s mentorship.

Wizards Beyond Waverly Place premieres Tuesday, Oct. 29 at 8 p.m. ET on Disney Channel and will be available to stream on Disney+.