Govinda — Restaurant in Maungakiekie-Tāmaki

A sour end to an acceptable dinner. My wife and I just attended Govinda in search of a authentic Indian vegetarian meal. Food-wise, we weren’t disappointed (good food at reasonable value ($16 p/p for a “deluxe” platter which we payed for before the meal). BUT when, half-way through the meal our host suggested us a masala chai tea to wash down our meal, things took bad turn: when we approached the counter to pay for the tea we were charged $9 dollars for a pot of tea! We thought “wow, that’s expensive for tea” but we payed. Great was our surprise when we checked what the prince for masala chai tea was on their online menu ($3.5)! How did we then get charged $9!? This left us with a very sour taste in our mouths as we felt taken advantage of, which is a real shame as we were the only people in the venue and, being a Hare Krishna establishment, we did not expect being squeezed of every penny we had on our pocket! We would not recommend this place,...

Ok so after finding out about this place we hauled ourselves all the way from west Auckland to get a slice! Mixed reactions best describe the food. The kachori we ordered was very very nice indeed. Freshly made and piping hot it was a really great start. Unfortunately the dosa was uninspiring. The delux thali was also very average and the potato bhaji was the same used in the dosa so we felt kind of duped ! I would've preferred the option to choose another bhaji as they do give you a choice of bhaji's however they failed to point out the duplication. The most uncomfortable thing though was the owners finger handling of the jalebis! Irrespective of the current situation with the pandemic food should be handled with tongs so his repeated picking up and serving of jalebi with his hands was very disappointing. Nice people and friendly though and they do make an effort on the food so not all bad....

To say that we were disappointed with this place is to say nothing. I expected from my experience a Hare Krishna cafe to have 1) super yummy vege food 2) reasonable prices. This place was just the opposite. We came for a takeaway dinner. They sold us 2 medium sized curries 14 dollars each, and a container of plain rice 10 dollars extra (!) Come on guys, nobody charges extra for plain rice, it's always included in curry price. We felt somehow tricked. Well, what did we see when we opened mixed vege curry at home? Stir fried frozen vege mix from countdown (peas, carrot, corn). This made us laugh the rest of the evening (one star for this). This is not the way you run such a business, guys. You just can't be so mean to...