My Govinda’s $

Ingrid said:

Where to start.. it is not impossible to find vegan food in Dubai. Nor is it hard in a place with so many luxury venues to find well cooked food. Even with that in mind my verdict is: some of the very best food I’ve ever had.

My Govinda’s serves you food that is Sattvic: moderation is key, oil is used sparingly and the spices are exquisitely blended. The emphasis is on fresh and high quality ingredients and they use plenty of vegetables. You should however be aware that this is not a vegan restaurant, it is important to specify to the waiter that you do not wish to eat dairy. Paneer and ghee are used, so explain carefully that ghee is not something you can eat either. They go out of their way to prepare something lovely for you (and manage quite well).

The website features a vegan menu. In the restaurant they did not have this menu, but the staff indicated they could adapt virtually any dish on the menu. I chose the Lahori Aloo and regretted it exactly never. Yum! The husband had another vegan dish which was also lovely. The accompanying rice had a touch of cumin, also delicious.

Tip 1: unless you are very used to eating significantly spicy food, don’t take a spicy dish here. They asked me how spicy I would like my aloo dish and I indicated that I am not very used to eating spicy food, so just a little. As it was, that was plenty of challenge for me 🙂

The restaurant does not serve alcohol. Trust me when I say you won’t miss it – their mocktails are divine. My husband had the rainbow, I took the planter’s punch. I still can’t tell you which one is the best, they were both delicious.

The restaurant was frequented by local people with Indian heritage, as far as I could see. There were no other tourists. It has a very pleasant and quiet ambiance. To my Dutch eye the prices are low and extremely reasonable considering the quality and portion size. That’s not necessarily the case in Dubai, however. So keep in mind that for a native, it may be more like $$.

Tip 2: you won’t be able to find this just on the direction. Google Maps knows exactly where it is, and it’s very likely that your taxi (or Uber) driver knows it as well.

PS Please note that this restaurant also has a place in Jumeira. The direct link to the vegan menu is http://mygovindas.com/VEGAN-MENU-GLUTEN.pdf