Over the past couple of months I have been review­ing Malay­si­an res­taur­ants all around Wel­ling­ton for Malay­sia Kit­chen (full dis­clos­ure – I got refun­ded some of the costs). It’s time to share the reviews!

With so many Malay­si­an res­taur­ants to choose from in the cap­it­al, some­times the decision simply comes down to where­abouts you are at any giv­en time. Satay Vil­lage on Ghuznee Street is fre­quently a win­ner when it comes to loc­a­tion, being just off Cuba Street (and hand­ily close to a num­ber of dair­ies that sell wine).

When we rocked up in a group of six at 7pm on a Wed­nes­day, we knew we were push­ing our luck not hav­ing a reser­va­tion, but luck­ily it was a nice enough night that we didn’t mind wait­ing on the street for 10 minutes before we could get a table.

Hav­ing a large group meant we got to try lots of things on the menu. We felt the spring rolls at $10 for six weren’t par­tic­u­larly good value, espe­cially since, as one of my com­pan­ions put it, on the night we went there appeared to be a lot more roll than spring – they could have used more filling. Beef satay with pea­nut sauce was charred nicely, but cry­ing out for more salt – which luck­ily was provided.

Much bet­ter were the chick­en wings – I’d nev­er ordered them before but they were deli­ciously crunchy, and lightly spiced with tur­mer­ic.

Tur­mer­ic was a reoc­cur­ring spice through­out our meals. Two of our party ordered mee goreng, which was avail­able with one, two or three addi­tions (chick­en, sea­food or veget­ables), and their plates were a huge pile of yel­low noodles.

I decided to try anoth­er dish I’ve nev­er had before, and so I ordered the most expens­ive thing on the menu at $18; a crumbed pork chop with creamy lem­on­grass sauce. It arrived as pieces of schnitzel instead of chops, but this was fine since at least I didn’t have to deal with any bones. The sauce is thick and deli­cious, made with coconut cream, but it was an incred­ibly rich com­bin­a­tion with the deep-fried pork. Beef ren­dang is served with lots of sauce, rather than the more tra­di­tion­al dry ver­sion, and although I didn’t sample it, the red chick­en curry looks tasty.

For quick food at fairly cheap prices, Satay Vil­lage deliv­ers. I like that it’s got a BYO license, unlike its nearby com­pet­it­ors, but if you’re look­ing for a place with an elab­or­ate fit-out and highly attent­ive ser­vice, you might want to look else­where.