Just weeks ago, Warisan was little more than a concept and a piece of branding. The opening of Nick Wigley and Alfan Musthafa’s new Indonesian restaurant has come about so fast they didn’t even have time for a planned research trip to Bali.

“We were scheduling that for the middle of November,” Wigley says. “But this opportunity came up so we kind of had to pull the trigger.”

You suspect it doesn’t matter – not initially, anyway. Musthafa is one of Brisbane’s most accomplished Indonesian chefs, having previously turned heads at Ma Pa Me on Little Stanley Street. The success of that venue led him to propose the idea of Warisan shortly after taking over the kitchen at Wigley’s Luckies Kitchen in Bulimba at the beginning of the year.

“When we opened Ma Pa Me [in late 2021] I was worried about how successful it would be, being Indonesian food,” Musthafa says. “But in the first few months, people were going crazy for it.”

Ma Pa Me was inspired by Musthafa’s experiences growing up in West Java, where on school holidays he would live with his grandparents on their farm, learning to cook from his grandmother.

Warisan is more about the street food he would eat in Bali on days off from working in hotel kitchens at Nusa Dua Beach Hotel, The Ritz-Carlton and Grand Hyatt Bali.

“I asked Nick, ‘Have you been to Bali? Have you been to Jimbaran [Bay] and seen the fresh seafood there?’” Musthafa says. “I wanted to bring that style to Brisbane, and he was, ‘Let’s do it.’”

The opportunity was an empty tenancy on Hynes Street in Fortitude Valley, previously occupied by burger spot Ze Pickle. Wigley and Musthafa’s approach to the fit-out was less-is-more. The old Ze Pickle bar with its 12 taps is still in place, as are the concrete tables, and the timber decking out front.

But the furniture has been replaced with old-school metal fold-out chairs that once belonged to Stephens RSL in Annerley, Wigley says, and the team has removed the more industrial elements while adding a liberal amount of yellow paint around the place to give it a lighter, brighter feel. In a back hallway is a wall of Indonesian film posters; in a front corner a couple of multi-game arcade machines.

“We want locals from the office buildings and apartments to come in here and have a good old time, like it says in our branding,” Wigley says. “Just the little knick-knacks we have around the place. The RSL chairs: imagine the good times they’ve had and we want people to have a good time here. Good food, good drinks, casual service.”

In keeping with the casual neighbourhood-hangout vibe, food is ordered at the bar from a menu split into small, medium and large plates.

For starters, vegetable spring rolls are served with a house sambal, crispy chicken skin with coriander seed, turmeric and sambal asam, and salt and pepper fried chicken with coriander seed, kaffir lime and kewpie mayo.

The medium plates focus on salads and stir fries and include a lawar salad of poached chicken, long beans, jackfruit and grated coconut, and a tahu toge tofu stir fry with bean sprouts, oyster sauce, chilli and garlic chives.

Larger dishes include ayam bakar taliwang (grilled half chicken marinated in Lombok red chilli paste). Jimbaran-style grilled snapper fillet served with a sambal matah, West Java-style marinated beef satay with an acar and sweet chilli soy, and a Central Javanese duck white curry with egg, jackfruit, lemongrass and kaffir lime leaf.

There’s also a significant vegan and plant-based menu that features tempe chips with spring onion, coriander seed and sambal peanut, a variation on the duck white curry that subs in cauliflower, and crispy noodles with mushroom and vegetables gravy.

“We’re going to do some regular lunchtime specials too,” Wigley says, “such as Indonesian-style pies, that sort of thing.”

Drinks have been kept relatively simple with the 12 taps split over seven beers, three cocktails and two wines. Elsewhere, there’s bottled beer (including the requisite Bintangs), a bunch of signature cocktails and a 25-bottle wine list that’s sourced almost exclusively from Australian boutique producers.

“It’s about being a cool place for people to come and eat and drink, but also somewhere you can return to,” Wigley says. “We want to keep it casual and we don’t want to break the bank.”

Open Tue-Sat 11.30am-late.

4 Hynes Street, Fortitude Valley.

warisan.com.au