Capitol Satay

Every meal I had in Melaka was a cut above, but Capitol Satay wins the foodie 100m sprint with clear air between it and the rest of the field - no photo finish required.

It's one of a select few Melakan restaurants specialising in Satay Celup - cooking skewered food in a big bucket of satay gravy - a fantastic Asian reworking of fondue with attitude, spice and taste, but without the dull 1970s dinner party connotations.

Steel circular tables pack out the open fronted restaurant, each with a hole in the middle where a bucket of gravy base sits above a roaring gas ring - just what you need in the tropical heat! Once it's bubbling nicely, a chef comes along and mixes in the secret blend of groundnuts and spices to get you started.

A long, open-fronted chill cabinet dominates one wall, packed out with the world on a skewer - prawns, squid, fish balls, and a load of stuff you have to get the staff to identify for you, as well as tightly wrapped bundles of chinese vegetables.

Then we're back to the table to get the skewers into the bucket and the cooking started - 1 minute for the pre-cooked stuff, 3 minutes for the larger uncooked stuff. Every now and again the waitress digs in and robustly stirs the gravy to prevent it burning, so watch out or your next mouthful will disappear into the depths of the satay sea, lost forever.

I knew I'd love the prawns, but was absolutely blown away by how good the morning glory was after a few minutes simmering in satay - has to be tasted to be believed. At the end of the meal, a girl comes to your table with a battered old calculator to count your empty skewers and sort the bill. Am pretty sure it was 50 sen per skewer - fab food for a fab price.

So, if you're in Melaka, then don't miss out on Capitol Satay, but if you try it at the weekend when the Singaporean day-trippers are out in force, then get ready for a queue around the block, so go early! (opens 5.30).

Enjoy!