Before Western fast-food chains ever entered Indonesia, nasi padang from Jakarta-born Restoran Sederhana was the place to go for a quick, cheap meal. Today, 54 years on, the homegrown chain remains the country’s favourite greasy spoon: a 2018 Roy Morgan survey found that it drew at least 4.4 million more patrons than KFC or Maccas.
From the mid-’90s, Sederhana began expanding beyond the archipelago. It now has around 200 shops across Indonesia and Malaysia, plus a recent opening in Singapore. After opening a Munich offshoot, Diva Minang, in early 2026, the empire put down its first Australian roots in the Melbourne’s CBD this June.
“We want to bring brands from Indonesia [to Australia] because we can see that it’s going to be a good market here,” says co-owner Hana Tania, the Indonesian-born restaurateur who brought Batam’s Ria Ayam Penyet to Melbourne as a student in 2013. (It’s since grown into an 11-store network nationwide.)
Tania “grew up knowing Sederhana”, and says the partnership came together when a Ria investor connected her to the family behind the chain. She flew to Jakarta with her chef whites for a week of training with Sederhana’s head chef of 35 years, before returning with her Melbourne team for a second intensive session.
Sederhana means “simple” in Bahasa Indonesia, a nod to the no-frills cuisine of the Minangkabau ethnic group that produced nasi padang. Locations in Indonesia and Malaysia serve it the traditional Minang way: carting dishes and rice to the table in a Tetris-like stack of small, cloth-wrapped plates. “You only open the ones you want to eat,” Tania explains. “Once it’s open and you touch it, you gotta pay for it.” But Australian food safety regulations required the Queen Street outpost to swap table service for a cafeteria-style line, where diners point to their picks before paying at the counter.
At least 25 dishes are available any time, whether by the plate, wrapped in banana leaves for takeaway, or laid out family-style. À la carte offerings like beef satay with ketupat rice cakes (soon to be joined by snapper head curry and crispy meat-filled martabaks) are made for sharing, but a slew of curries anchors Sederhana’s nasi padang options.
Six different curry bases fill the bain-maries with a gradient of warm tones. The bestselling beef rendang starts with a 20-spice paste with fragrant leaves (pandan, lime, turmeric, you name it) that’s reduced to a dry brown curry over nine hours. Rich, orange-coloured chicken gulai gravy is spooned over rice, while fiery-red asam pedas (catfish curry) leans sour and spicy.
Earthy cassava leaf curry is simmered with eggplants and anchovies until it turns green (Tania says that one’s “hit or miss” with unaccustomed diners) while jackfruit infuses its sweetness into a coconut milk curry with boiled long beans and cabbage. Both run milder and thinner than the rest of the curry menu, designed to temper their meaty counterparts.
Sederhana’s signature spice mixes stand out amid Melbourne’s warung boom. They’re meticulously sourced from around the world and ground at the central kitchen in Jakarta, before being brought over to Melbourne. “Even if I mix the exact same [ingredients] here, the flavour is just different,” Tania says.
That helps explain the relentless crowds on opening weekend – Tania reckons 95 per cent of those customers were Indonesians who are “willing to queue” for Padang cuisine – which prompted a temporary pause on weekday dinner service.
A number of fried or grilled Padang staples complement the saucy nasi padang accompaniments. Ayam pop, a glossy skinless chicken that’s poached then fried in coconut oil, comes with a side of house-made sriracha. Plush omelettes are flecked with grated coconut, while hard-boiled eggs are stir-fried with an aromatic balado spice mix. Crispy beef lungs, dried in-house and served with chilli, are a personal must-order for Tania.
There are also five elaborate sambal stir-fries, including one combining tempeh and anchovy, and another with punchy dogfruit seeds similar to stink beans.
The CBD space is fitted out with banquettes swathed in handwoven songket fabrics, just like Sederhana’s other stores. Tania has plans to open in Perth by December, followed by a third location in Sydney.
Sederhana
207 Queen Street, Melbourne(03) 7054 5175
Hours:
Daily 11am–3pm, 4.30pm–8pm
