Wedged between a construction site and a vacant cafe on Kent Street in Sydney’s CBD is The Sambal, an unassuming mid-sized Indonesian restaurant.
When it opened its doors in September 2017, it was one of the only eateries of its kind in the area. But co-owner Nessiana Pamudji says that’s changed in recent years thanks to a burgeoning demand for Indonesian cuisine.
Pamudji tells SBS News she’s witnessed a number of restaurant openings in the neighbourhood, which is just north of Chinatown in Sydney, and says it’s slowly becoming “little Indonesia”.
“I [really] like it because that means there’s more choice for people and then people are more aware of [Indonesian food],” she says.
“Before, I think, Indonesian is not well-known and [it can be] confused with Malaysian, but with these restaurants popping around in an area, people are more aware of what the difference is,” Pamudji says.
She says local interest in Indonesian food has increased over recent years, including from customers who herald from other ethnic communities and Australians, who seem more ready to accept the cuisine — even with traditional levels of spice.
A boom in Indonesian cuisine
While there are established pockets of Indonesian restaurants in some Australian capital cities, such as those in Kingsford and Kensington in eastern Sydney, the cuisine of one of the country’s closest neighbours is becoming more popular, with restaurants and grocery stores popping up in city centres and mainstream food hubs.
A number of Indonesian restaurants have also opened multiple branches across cities, such as Garam Merica and chain restaurant D’Penyetz & D’Cendol.
Siswo Pramono, Indonesia’s ambassador to Australia, tells SBS News he has been “very busy opening new restaurants” and grocery stores since he started his role three years ago.
He says although Australia has long embraced a diverse mix of cuisines, including popular Asian cuisines such as Thai, Chinese, and Japanese, Indonesian food has historically received far less attention.
A number of Indonesian restaurants have opened in Sydney’s CBD in recent years. Source: SBS News
A 2023 report by Indonesia’s National Research and Innovation Agency (found the cuisine to be “conspicuously absent from the country’s [Australia’s] culinary imagination”.
Pramono says while the two countries have a close partnership, “in terms of trade and culture, we are a bit new”.
Winnie Nawei is the co-founder of Little Indo Town, a collection of three Indonesian food and beverage brands based in Sydney.
Like Pamudji, she’s witnessed significant growth in the city’s Indonesian food community in recent years and says Australian consumers are looking for more adventurous food experiences.
“[We use] the herbs that no other country’s food dishes have … we use a lot of traditional herbs such as ‘ketumbar’, which is what we call here coriander spices,” she says.
Indonesian food is famous for the spiciness, the richness. Some people do not really want to jump into that bold flavour yet, whereas nowadays I see more people trying, willing to try.
Nawei came to Australia from Sumatra 15 years ago as a student and says it is also meaningful to be surrounded by foods that remind her of home.
“As an Indonesian expat that lives overseas, we often miss our home, the taste of home cooking,” she says.
“Opening Indonesian restaurants here, we try to bring more [authentic] food because Indonesia has a lot of regions where all of the flavours are different.”
Indonesian food has historically received less attention than other cuisines, according to Siswo Pramono, Indonesia’s ambassador to Australia. Source: SBS News
‘Gastrodiplomacy’
The rise in Indonesian eateries mirrors the growth in Australia’s Indonesian population over the past decade.
According to the Department of Home Affairs, as of June 2022, there were 96,800 Indonesian-born people living in Australia — an increase of 30.2 per cent compared to the population in 2012.
The number of Indonesian tourists has also increased in recent years. Over 12 months between 2023-24, more than 215,000 Indonesians visited Australia — up 31 per cent compared with the year before, according to Tourism Research Australia. That number is predicted to continue to rise over the next five years.
However, the growing success of Indonesian cuisine is also due in part to ‘gastrodiplomacy’ efforts by the Indonesian government dating back to 2021.
The term gastrodiplomacy was coined in an Economist article in 2002 to describe a program of soft power diplomacy launched by the Thai government known as Global Thai.
Its leaders at the time recognised the global love for Thai food could boost tourism to the Southeast Asian nation and strengthen diplomatic ties with other countries.
The program aimed to grow the number of Thai restaurants operating overseas to 8,000 over a year from around 5,500. By 2011, there were more than 10,000 Thai restaurants around the world, according to the Thai government.
Gastrodiplomacy expert Paul Rockower describes the strategy as “winning the hearts and minds through stomachs”.
Following the success of Global Thai, many other countries have started their own programs.
Taiwan launched ‘Dim Sum Diplomacy’ in 2010, a program spanning four years that was allocated more than $US34 million ($54 million) in an attempt to boost the nation’s global profile.
The same year, Malaysia began its ‘Malaysian Kitchen for the World’ program to expand Malaysian food into the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand and China.
Top Malaysian chefs were flown to food festivals and events, kicking off night markets in cities around the world.
Similarly, Japan has practised its own gastrodiplomacy since 2014 through the ‘Cool Japan Fund’, which has helped to increase the number of ramen restaurants overseas.
The operator of Ippudo ramen restaurants — a chain that was already popular in Japan and some Asian cities — received $US16 million ($25 million) to expand to London, Sydney, New York, Singapore and Seoul.
Australia followed suit in 2014 with its $10 million ‘Restaurant Australia’ campaign, launching as part of Tourism Australia’s global campaign ‘There’s Nothing Like Australia’, which aimed to showcase the nation’s food and wine experiences.
Unlike other gastrodiplomacy campaigns, Australia relied on the onshore promotion of its food offerings and invited international influencers to document their eating experiences around the country on a week-long tour.
Meilinda Sari Yayusman, a researcher at the National Research and Innovation Agency, tells SBS News gastrodiplomacy is unique due to its ability “to integrate various diplomatic practices, particularly cultural and culinary diplomacy, to capture public attention”.
When introducing our authentic cuisine internationally, it is inseparable from the country’s cultural identity — especially in Indonesia, where cultural diversity is deeply embedded in our nation.
In 2021, the Indonesian government launched a national action plan for its food and spices strategy called ‘Indonesia Spice Up the World’.
The program aimed to increase spice exports from Indonesia by up to two billion by 2024 and create 4,000 additional Indonesian restaurants abroad.
It also involved promoting Indonesian food through culinary festivals and training programs, increasing the availability of traditional Indonesian foods and education about key dishes.
‘Indonesia Spice Up the World’ was a gastrodiplomacy program launched by the Indonesian government in 2021. Source: SBS News
Nasi goreng, rendang, satay, soto (traditional soup) and gado gado (salad with peanut sauce) were highlighted as dishes to take to the world stage.
The Indonesian embassy in Australia says the Indonesia Spice Up the World program has been a marked success.
It says the number of people visiting Indonesian restaurants and food markets has increased, and Indonesia’s exports to Australia have risen dramatically.
Indonesia’s exports to Australia increased by 56 per cent last year from 2023, and food and beverage products were among the main commodities.
Food as a gateway to culture
Pramono says while more Indonesian restaurants, grocery stores, food vans and market stalls have cropped up in Australia, Indonesia is still aiming to increase the popularity of imported food and beverage products, such as Indonesian beer.
Melbourne’s Indonesian arts and culture festival Nongkrong Festival (which has not received funding from the Indonesian government) will showcase an array of traditional foods this year, including dishes that may be new to Australian consumers.
Siblings Darryl and Moira Tirtha launched the Indonesian food and culture festival Nongkrong in Melbourne. Credit: Emil Raji
Siblings Darryl and Moira Tirtha launched Nongkrong in 2024 to provide a space for Indonesian Australians to connect and maintain ties with their homeland, as well as introduce Australians to different parts of Indonesian culture and history.
The name Nongkrong is derived from a joke between friends, explains Moira, but it’s also an Indonesian term that means “hanging out” without any particular time constraints or purpose.
“We wanted to, I guess, showcase more of what contemporary Indonesia looks like,” Darryl says.
“I think people have this viewpoint of maybe Bali as one place; maybe they’ve been to Yogyakarta but, you know, they only really see it from one particular lens.”
Moira (left) and Darryl Tirtha (right) are showcasing contemporary Indonesian culture at Nongkrong Festival. Credit: Tom Hvala
The siblings are also trying to share different regional cuisines — Indonesia has multiple food regions and over 5,000 traditional recipes. This year, Nongkrong is presenting more food from Sulawesi, rather than relying solely on offerings from Java and Bali, which Australians may be more accustomed to.
The pair see food as an integral “gateway” to a broader understanding and appreciation of culture.
“Food is a really easy conduit to start to appreciate other things,” Darryl says.
He believes the simple act of eating a dish can lead to an ongoing connection, in which someone may then try to cook the food, learn more about it or seek out experiences involving that food.
“It’s just a really important platform for trying to understand more of it, because everybody’s got to eat and you know, people in Australia love to try new things,” he says.
Darryl and Moira Tirtha say food can act as a “gateway” to culture. Credit: Emil Raji
A lack of ‘fine dining’
Despite its growing popularity, there is still a distinct lack of Indonesian fine dining options in Australia.
Moira, who curates the food experiences for Nongkrong, says even though more Indonesian restaurants are popping up around Melbourne, she doesn’t believe it’s “anywhere near the mainstream” yet.
She says part of the reason is that many Indonesian eateries cater to low-income communities, adding some expats may be less willing to spend money on traditional cuisine than they would on European dining experiences, which she chalks up to “internalised racism”.
“In terms of cultural capital, it [Indonesian food] still sits at the bottom of the food hierarchy. I think it’s still restricted to the ‘cheap eats’ section and I think there’s still a struggle for a lot of Indonesian restaurants to charge more than $15 or $20 for their food,” she says.
Pramono believes there is untapped potential for Indonesian food to enter the fine dining space, even going so far as to suggest wine pairings for different dishes, such as a pinot noir for rendang (a meat dish) and shiraz for chicken satay.
But he says there is still a cultural barrier to overcome because Australians tend to socialise in restaurants and take time to eat, while Indonesians tend not to.
“We are talking about cultural relations here, we are talking about cultural communication,” Pramono says.
However, he remains hopeful that Indonesian restaurants will adapt over time, offering dishes in a more Australian-friendly style, with staggered courses and a more social atmosphere.
