Johnny Nation's Chocolate Eclair Shop — Restaurant in North Island

This review is specifically for the famous Chocolate Eclairs. We bought a few chocolate éclairs between us this morning. Sadly that brown stuff on top is just weakly flavored sugar. Nothing chocolate about these anymore. $5 each now. They were $1.90 about 13 years ago and we used to drive up from Palmy 4 times a season just to buy some and we'd buy the bakers dozen and sometimes 2 doz at a time to share with friends and family. These days we don't make special trips and buy one or two each and after today I won't be buying them again. I ate half of my one today and will be giving the other half to some unsuspecting target/victim (found one 2nd pic) lol Chocolate éclairs are meant to be éclairs with proper chocolate icing on them. Not milo, not hot chocolate flavoring but proper Cocoa and icing sugar icing, dark brown and chocolatey. Thank goodness we didn't make a special trip up for them today. Staff are lovely. The cheese topped beef pies were nice today but a couple of months ago they were terrible and I said I wouldnt buy one again but they looked better today so did. Today's beef n cheese pies which are pastry cased bottom and cheese topped no pastry on top but we like that, is beef mince no chunks of beef like they used to have, was ok but too much sugar in it. Kiwis don't like sugar in the meat pies they are meant to be savory, and the sausage rolls are yum this time and last time too. I also bought a slice of passionfruit cheesecake which wasn't very passionfruity except for the teaspoon of creamy yummy passionfruit topping which could/should have been spread in a thick layer across the whole top for perfection as the top of it wasn't enough to spread across the entire top (wont buy that again either) but the famous éclairs have definitely fallen from grace. I also got a wholemeal chicken sandwich yet to eat but have high hopes for that. I spent $29. My...

Too bad the girls working the counter do not seem to enjoy serving customers. Maybe it was a bad hair day; who knows. But it really put a downer-vibe on this experience right from the beginning. I bought two items - a donut with whipped cream and a cake with whipped cream. The donut was chewy - almost like a yeast bread. The cake one wasn't that bad - super light cake. But the best part of both was the whipped cream. As it turned out, the tour group I was with made a stop here the next morning to treat us all to one of the famous chocolate eclairs. Hate to say it, but the chioux was chewy, the chocolate on top too sweet and too much, and the best part was the whipped cream. This is a great example of what a good ad campaign can generate. Sorry I can't be more positive, but maybe my expectations...

Was really disappointed. Saw it was "famous" and it's advertised on out Top10 brochure, but maybe famous for the wrong reasons?

Pastry was tasteless, icing had no flavour, cream was plain. Felt sick afterwards.

Had a "steak, mince & cheese pie" which had no steak in it, had no flavour and looked like yesterday's reheats. Husbands was burnt on the bottom, and 1 piece of steak in it. Sons sausage roll tasted yuck too.

Service was very subpar with the girl rolling her eyes at us when my kids struggled to make a decision.

Presentation of the food was sub-par. Not what i expected after seeing some of the other shops in ohakune which have had top notch service, presentation and quality of food. Happy to pay for quality, disappointed the reputation seems to outrank the quality in...