Skewers of turmeric and lemongrass marinated chicken, beef or mutton grilled over charcoal and eaten with a sweet, chunky peanut sauce, cucumber, onion and ketupat rice cakes. An evening food in Kuala Lumpur.
Where to eat it: 4 restaurants across 2 cities.
Satay is grilled, spice-marinated meat on bamboo skewers, a dish shared across maritime Southeast Asia and made a Malay street staple in the peninsula. The meat is rubbed with turmeric, lemongrass, galangal and coriander, threaded onto thin sticks and turned over charcoal while the cook fans the embers, then served with peanut sauce, raw onion, cucumber and pressed rice cakes. Kajang, south-east of Kuala Lumpur, is known nationally as the satay town, but the capital has its own stalls: Kasim Satay grills at Pasar Sentul's evening food bazaar, and the grills on Jalan Alor run late into the night.
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Common allergens: Peanuts
Tip from the editors. Baste with oil using a lemongrass stalk bruised into a brush, the way stall cooks do, for extra fragrance.
Kasim Satay grills chicken and beef satay at Pasar Sentul in Kuala Lumpur, where the wet market turns into an evening food bazaar, from about RM0.90 a stick.
OrderBeef satay and chicken satay with peanut sauce, by the stick.
Why locals goIt is a plain stall inside Sentul's market bazaar, far from the tourist satay strips, and most customers are locals ordering sticks in bulk.
TipIt takes bulk orders, 10 to 100 sticks at a time, so call ahead to avoid a wait for a large batch.
Jalan Alor Food Street is a full block of open air kitchens in Bukit Bintang, Kuala Lumpur, with tables spilling onto the road well past midnight.
TryGrilled seafood, char kway teow, satay and claypot dishes
TipArrive by 18:30 for a table before the after work crowd fills the whole strip.
From 7pm every evening Boon Tat Street alongside the Victorian cast-iron market closes to traffic and becomes Singapore's most atmospheric outdoor satay street, with nine charcoal-fired satay stalls serving skewers of chicken, mutton and beef under open sky in the CBD. The interior hawker centre operates 24 hours for early-morning and late-night eating after the last trains stop.
TipSatay Street is best from 7.30pm to 10pm when the charcoal fires are fully going. After midnight the interior stalls handle the remaining trade.
The most beloved neighbourhood hawker centre in Serangoon Gardens, operating entirely in the evening and late-night window from 4pm to midnight or later. The Ah Hock Fried Hokkien Mee holds a Michelin recognition; the satay, barbecue stingray and oyster omelette stalls draw the local evening dining crowd. One of the few hawker centres with a genuinely nocturnal character.
TipOpen approximately 4pm to 12.30am. Most stalls do not open until after 5pm. Take bus 73 or 136 from Serangoon Bus Interchange.
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