We’ve been to Masala a couple of times, in my honest opinion it’s not the best. Table for 2, ordered 2 butter chicken with rice and 2 garlic naan bread…naan bread came out cut up and in a ‘communal’ style bowl…there’s nothing like tearing chunks off your own individual naan and eating at your leisure instead of racing my naan loving fiance. Butter chicken sauce is also very, very tomato-y and left me with a severe case of heart burn, I’ve not had this problem anywhere else.

After reading mixed reviews I was very skeptical, I went in and was kindly greeted and the waitress was really helpful in suggesting some mains of my taste. I got the chicken korma, it was nice the flavors shinned through the more I ate it. I was shocked that others had bad service, I had a great experience and will be going again.

I have been a regular customer at this restaurant over the last few years both at the old premises and the new situated on great south road. My partner and I have even recommended Masala and also taken many friends and family here… all of these experiences have been fair to good sometimes the wait for our food has taken longer than it should have due to the restaurant over booking and staff unable to cope with the volume of people but the food has always been very good. This particular visit I made the booking more than 24hours prior and there was no problem we entered Masala and it was clearly over booked by the time we arrived and a person was at the counter complaining as his takeout order appeared to have lost. We were seated and an hour later still no meal we asked the waitress when we would expect our meal she said she didn’t know as the manager was unable to tell them. The manager continued to take more customers when the ones in the restaurant were not being served another had waited 1 1/2 hours. The manager would not talk to the customers or help the staff who were offering complimentary drinks but we had come out for a meal. This manager was clearly out of his depth and should not be in this position as clearly does not know how to run a restaurant and has lost customers as we got up and walked out as no meal was in sight after 1 hour. The staff were trying their best to serve the large volumes but the manager was not experienced or were they being too greedy to get customers. Either way they have lost customers by doing this.We decided to return to see if things have improved and the experience was much more pleasant and we even got to have a very nice dinner well done staff and same duty manager. We suggest that over booking is not the way to go to satisfy your customers.

I’m at my wits end with Masala. I get a Curry about once a week and have tried the Lamb Vindaloo 4 times now. Fantastic curry’s…no-doubt about it. Great flavour and meat is tender and suculant but unfortunaly Vindaloo’s are ment to be on the hotter side. I order mine “Indian Hot” and it’s no more than medium. Last week while ordering I made clear that Indian hot wasn’t cutting it and had to be hotter…”Yes yes…hotter!” the man siad…but alass…still the same. Ordered again tonight and really made it CLEAR to them, Indian hot ain’t what I call HOT etc etc. “Yes Yes..I make sure they make it Extra HOT HOT HOT!” the man say’s…I get it and it’s milder than last time..infact, I’d go as far to say it’s the was the mildest Vindaloo’s Ive ever had in my life! What are they playing at? I’ve been served twice now by an Indian girl who looks like she’d rather be somewhere else and when she grumpily mumbles to me “Enjoy your Meal” it’s without any conviction what so ever….I have more personality in my little toe. 3 stars purely because the Curry’s are great…the best in Papakura, but the staff need work and it can’t be rocket science to make a Curry a little bit hotter than normal? (Especially when I ask for hotter and it comes back milder!!??)

A group of four adults had dinner at Masala Papakura on a Thursday evening; I had booked the table on the Monday beforehand. I had read the previous reviews on this website, but had eaten at Masala at its previous location, and at the current location under its previous ownership. Given that prior experience I was happy to suggest to our party that we should dine again at Masala Papakura.

The booking was taken politely and efficiently. We were greeted and shown to our table. The staff were polite and helpful, and showed they had a sense of humour and understanding when we ordered our meals. The food was excellent, and all four of us will certainly dine again at Masala Papakura.

To assist in improving service delivery:

 The disabled carpark(s) should be adjacent to the front door, not at the end of the carpark.
 The lighting should be increased – we asked for a torch (which was readily given) to read the menu.
 It was a hot muggy evening, one door was open at the far end of the restaurant – make use of the aircon.
 Meal delivery slowed when we reached desert – apart from that we could not find fault with the speed of service.
 The desert two of us chose was listed on the menu as with ice cream but was delivered without it. The waitress promptly sorted that out with the chef!

Lasting memories – the excellent food, the desert with “spongy balls” (waitress description), and the polite and helpful staff. We will return!

Well you just would not believe what happened to us tonight. I tell you, we were handed the insult of insults.

We went to Masala Restaurant for tea tonight. We had a lovely meal and I had two glasses of wine and Joe had two glasses of beer.

We went to leave. I stood in the reception area of the restaurant with Joe for a while and they were taking a long time. I chatted with a few people waiting for their takeaways saying how lovely the meal was. As it was taking so long I thought I would go outside and get in the car and bring it to the door.

Joe waited behind to pay for our meal. I got in the car and the next thing there was this employee of the restaurant knocking on my car window. I opened the door and said what is the matter. He said Mam you were at table 6 you have not paid for your meal. I said My husband is there and he is paying for it. What are you talking about?.

He went away and I backed the car around. Joe got in the car and I said you will never believe what happened. Then I told him about the guy knocking on the window and he said the guy in the restaurant told him that he went out and came back in. Joe said he told them he had been standing there waiting to pay. He had seen the guy rush outside and asked him, you didnt bail my wife up did you cause she would be pissed at you. The guy said no, no, no,… I did not. When Joe told me that it was just too much. I marched back into that restaurant and asked them what they were playing at.

I said you accused my husband of going out and coming back in, when he was here waiting to pay and some guy came out and knocked on my car window telling me I had left without paying. He said I am sorry mam. I said where is the manager. He said I am the manager. I said what do you intend to do about this? He said, I can only apologize mam. I said and thats it. He said yes. I said we have been in here lots of times and I have never felt so insulted in all my life and we will not be back.

What a bad end to a nice meal and evening. Thumbs down to the jerks at Masala in Papakura.

Went as part of a group of ten, when we arrived the restaurant was empty, so we potentially had the attention of all the six or seven waitstaff milling around near the bar.

We ordered our meals and waited for the entrees to arrive. Some of them arrived. I waited a bit longer (ten more minutes) then guessed that somehow my prawns had been overlooked. After some time attempting to get the attention of the young woman who had taken my order, she went away to check progress of my entree (in the meantime the others had long finished). When she returned she explained that they had a touch-screen thing to input the orders and mine mustn’t have gone through. OK… I told her that I didn’t want to eat it on my own so I wouldn’t bother with it, when two more people arrived at our table and ordered entrees, so I decided I would indeed place my order again.

The prawns arrived fairly promptly, and although they were nicely cooked and tender, they were very bland. A request for salt took two minutes longer than the time I took to finish my bland prawns.

When the mains arrived, a man with a large tray came out, stood at the top of the table and called out the mains he had. We had to put up our hands to indicate which one was ours. What is so hard about allocating a main to a particular seat? Some of our party found it hard to understand the heavy Indian accent of the man, so this made it difficult to work out which main belonged to which person.

A particular gripe was that the garlic naans we ordered came in a large basket, cut up for us to share. For the price of the garlic naan, we all agreed we would have preferred our own serving. We didn’t know how much was fair for each person to take… some had plenty, and others seemed to only have a little as a result of the communal basket.

When we had finished eating our mains, a waiter came over to tell us that our table was booked for another large group at 7:30 (less than ten minutes away) and asked that we please leave as soon as possible. We were quite shocked, as we had not been advised that our dining time was so limited. As the person who booked the table, I can say with certainty that I was not advised that we would have to vacate our seats after an hour and a half.

When it came time to pay the bill I was one of the last so I inquired if an extra entree that had been ordered had been paid for (wasn’t sure as the person I had ordered it for had left already and as I had ordered it I felt it was my responsibility to check). I was told which entrees were still to be paid, and as the last two people behind me said they were theirs, it was clear to me it had been paid. Some of us were milling around outside since we had not finished our conversation at the time we were asked to leave, imagine my surprise when the man at reception came running out a few minutes later trying to find someone to pay for the extra entree that remained unpaid. I was very embarrassed. His manner suggested that he thought I had been trying to “rip them off”. He also claimed that someone had ordered a cheese naan that was not paid for (he clearly expected me to pay for this too), but nobody had done so, and we had spent a good ten minutes telling waitstaff about it earlier.

Also at this time I was asked to pay for TWO prawns I had allegedly eaten and which were on the bill. I explained that I had only ordered one, and was told the first time it had not been recorded on the computer, which resulted on me not getting it, so I reordered it. This SHOULD have been the one that appeared on the bill. This made me wonder if I had been told a little white lie by the young woman who messed up the original order when she said it had never gone through.

I really felt that I had to defend myself and was considered less than truthful during this exchange.

There are clearly issues in this restaurant related to ordering and payment options. Is it so hard to allocate an order to a seat or a person?

The food was pretty average really. Luckily it was a night when they had their $10 mains on, so it was cheap, but still. Not a good experience, and one that our party and I certainly will NOT be repeating.

Went here when they opened at their new location next to KFC, it was absolutely disgusting! We waited over 40 Min’s for 1 main and 2 Naan breads and there was no-one in the restaurant. The chicken was fatty and gross and the butter chicken sauce was one of the worse I have ever tasted, the Maggi packet recipe is better in my eyes. Will not be going back here at all.

Good tasting curry – when they do the $10 mains deal, it is well worth it!
Staff at this branch do become quite annoying though as they hang around too much whilst you are trying to eat or have jut finished..
Maybe this type of service is only on the $10 mains days?!
Dessert here is also a must – its always a treat!

I am a regular at the restaurant once i got a taste of the ingredients that they are using. And that taste was of freshness which all other Indian restaurants are lacking. You do have to wait a bit when ordering especially when busy. Overall good experiences with them.

P.S. I only order vegetarian dishes so cannot comment on the quality of the meat dishes

told by their staff, that they are using Halal meat and chicken, but they have no clear signage outside. Had I known, I would never had become part of this cruelity based food, which is against animal welfare.
****Halal slaughtering is where they half cut the throat of animal or bird and leave it in pain, distress and crying for 5 minutes and let the blood to drain out, then Quran is recited over the crying animal, and finally it dies in pain and is sent for dressing up. In U.K. people have started boycotting all the halal restaurants. Authentic Indian restaurant would never use Halal, this is form of Muslim restaurant.

What basically this means that before you do any prayer, Quran has already been recited on your food and underneath somewhere there lies cries and pain of that animal or bird, Do not become part of animal cruelity, ask for normal meat not Halal.

Tell them to display signage outside their restaurant that this is Muslim Restaurant and uses Halal, prominently.

Had both takeaway and eat in experiences with pleasure.

Very accomodating for children and comfortable decor. The food was excellent and authentic. Definately the best Indian restuarant in the area and not so much the only one so has the market but more like the best so the only reason the others did not survive.

Full credit to them for keeping a good standard of food and service for a now franchised resturant.

Look forward to eating there again.

My daughter and I love Indian food – We had passed Masala on several occasions and seen the $10 Lunches – As a holiday treat we went for lunch – The staff were friendly and lunch arrived quickly – I had Roganjosh and my daughter had Butter Chicken – It was well presented and scrumptious – Rice, Curry, Naan Bread, a Poppadom and either a Fizzy drink or Fruit Juice – Well worth $10 – $12 if you would prefer a Wine or Beer instead – Of course mine was $12 – I enjoyed the meal so much I took a friend for lunch the following week – She too enjoyed the meal and thought the service was good – We will be regulars and have no hesitation in telling our friends about Masala – Thank you

My phone order took 1 hour and 40 minutes!
Other customers waited an average of 30-45 minutes for their orders.

The staff were totally unapologetic, and the manager actually mocked me when I said I was not going to come back. The poor level of service at Masala is actually insulting to customers and I will definitely advise my friends and family to avoid this restaurant.

With the amount of Indian restaurants in Papakura, you can afford not to go to Masala.

couple of months went to masala in Papakura . went with a group of 30 . i love the food but the customer service sucked . we got our on trays with our main meal. they were hovering over us always asking if we wanted water and we were just trying to eat . i love Butter Chicken from masala but i think i would rather take home then Dine in .

We arrived at a very busy Masala with no reservation but the staff accommodated us anyway. We found the service outstanding – the staff were very attentive, the food came quickly and tasted great!! The 3 of us have all travelled to India in the past and I definitely rate their cooking. I can report nothing negative about our dining experience at Masala and cant wait to go back again.

Despite being part of a chain & having a fancy website, this restaurant really did not deliver the goods.

We booked through their website the night before, had 3 confirmation emails clarifying questions, and then they didn’t have our reservation. “The manager has gone home so we can’t check”.

With only 1 other table there we were seated on a tiny table for 5. So tiny that there was no space for our food. The waiter simply persisted in saying “make some space please”. We ended up sending our water glasses away so it could fit. Amusingly, they then came and placed a candle in amongst our food pile.

With 7 staff on for 2 tables you’d think this would improve, but no one took responsibility or seemed interested in us. The staff at the bar (maitre ‘d?) took very little interest in this.

Food was okay, not as spicy as we had ordered, but punctually delivered (once we had cleared the table) and with some flavour. This restaurant does a $10 main on three other days of the week, which would have made the food price more on par with the service received.

Proof that looks can be deceiving.