Hello Please

Hello Please opened in 2016 as a Vietnamese street food-inspired restaurant in a car park beneath a South Brisbane rail overpass. But Hello Please (and its winsomely weird location) was only ever meant to be temporary. In 2019, it finally moved to its permanent home. Luckily it wasn’t a big move – it’s just across the lane from the old spot.

From the outside the restaurant looks totally different. The first thing you notice is the large bar area that faces Fish Lane. Enclosed behind a line of bi-fold windows and rendered in beech ply, subway tiles and concrete aggregate floors, it’s an inviting space lit by red lanterns. The Hello Please signatures come out in the yellow and white awning and the street art painted across the first floor facade.

To the right of the bar is a semi-enclosed dining area that stretches to the rear of the building. The picnic tables from the old space have been sliced in two and painted black, adding to the grungy, hawker market feel.

The menu continues the hawker theme, with plenty of dishes and flavours you might find at a street stall in one of a handful of country’s throughout Asia. You might start with prawn toast with yuzu kewpie and chives; pillowy bao stuffed with katsu eggplant; and lobster dumplings bathing in a fermented chilli butter. Follow with a serve of cheesy cacio e pepe udon, a riff on the classic Roman dish.