Honey Cafe Ponsonby — Restaurant in Waitematā

A Really disappointing experience here today:

I advised the waitress I was dairy free and asked whether they could make the eggs Benedict dairy free by removing the hollandaise sauce The waitress returned and advised they couldn't do that, so I asked instead for the big breakfast and asked for that dairy free. I asked for ciabatta as the bread and also pointed to the meal on the menu to clarify. My friend and I then waited over 30 minutes for our meals - at no point were we told there was a long wait on food (not a problem and appreciate places are busy, but a heads up would have been nice). My meal arrived which was wrong, they'd given me the eggs Benedict. I explained that I couldn't eat it because I am dairy free. They checked and then advised they had put the correct order through as priority. After another 10 min wait they served me the big breakfast and included butter on top! When I later spoke to the manager they did clarify butter is not used in the meal (I'm not 100% confident this is the case) was put on the top as habit. Especially after the first meal was returned to the kitchen because of dairy, you'd expect them to want to be extra cautious. I had to ask for compensation, this was not offered to me in the first instance. No one checked how our meals were, or checked on our table.

All in all I wouldn't return...

We were very excited to try this cafe again as few years ago, before they changed name, they were amazing. Gathered few friends and head to the cafe. There were too many people working there but service was slow and no one knew what they were doing. Coffees came late, we had no cutleries and had to wait till someone gets them to us 2 minutes after food arrived. No one was collecting empty cups from the table. The coffee was great though, came to the table hot and was a good coffee. We were very excited to try the chicken waffle, it looked insta worthy but stopped there. The waffle was soggy before we even pure the sauce on it , big Noooo, mate we want crispy waffle, and chicken was way too dry and tasteless. They use chicken tenders and fry the s... out of them so by the time it gets to the table is dry as a bone. Use chicken thighs and marinate the chicken before hand. It supposed to be Korean fusion and nothing about it was Korean. It was a total fail for us. Anyway another unsatisfying expensive breakfast. This cafe definitely has potential to be really great and I hope they listen to these reviews and change the shortfalls as we really want...

Super loud acoustics make it impossible to hear each other. They need to add some soft furnishings to help absorb some noise, as this makes a stressful & unpleasant experience. Aside from that, we ordered coffees while being seated, these took 45minutes to come. Ordered breakfast right away, myself a salmon & cream cheese bagel & my husband scrambled eggs on toast. This took 1hr & 15min to arrive at our table. They brought out a pile of egg on a plate without the toast and said the toast was still coming. Toast took another 8min to come, egg was cold in this time. By this time our baby is crying and has missed his nap time. Not sure why this place is so popular to be honest. One would expect a slight discount for all the inconveniences, unfortunately that was not even offered! Not even an apology... Definitely wont...