Satay House

From this quiet corner of the Edgware Road, Satay House has been serving Malaysian food to homesick expats for almost 40 years. Today, the area, like the restaurant, has been spruced up. The interior has an easy-on-the eye modern design with hibiscus flower motifs, red leather or beige walls and oak flooring.

The menu is loaded with favourites from hawker stalls, so you'll find numerous noodle dishes including laksa. The meat in the chicken and lamb satays seemed more tender than on our last visit, but the peanut sauce lacked oomph. For the adventurous, this is a place to try petai (twisted cluster beans), commonly known as 'stink beans' due to their unusual strong smell. A dish of king prawns stir-fried in fresh ground shrimps was jam-packed with onions, but could have done with more chilli. Blachan (hot shrimp paste) helped to ignite a dish of stir-fried kangkong (water convolvulus, aka morning glory).

On our visit, the only Malaysians present were those dining, which could explain why the dishes lacked spiciness. Service was laid-back and cheery. We finished with sago gula melaka (steamed sago pudding with palm sugar) drowning in coconut milk, followed by sweet, milky teh tarik ('stretched tea').