The voices usually wafted over the muggy tropical breeze, reaching your ears long before you stepped into the slightly grimy hawker center that offered a sweeping view of the Singapore harbor.

"Satayyy! Satayyy!" "Stall No. 1!" "Anything to drink? Sugar-cane juice?"

Before government officials in my native Singapore chased away the Satay Club hawkers in 1995 to make way for a multimillion-dollar arts complex, my family and I regularly trekked to this outdoor food center to stuff ourselves with the scrumptious Malay barbecued beef, chicken or mutton skewers.

This particular hawker center in this Southeast Asian country had almost 30 stalls selling satay and a variety of Malay dishes like mee goreng (spicy fried noodles) or soup kambing (mutton soup). In front of each booth, a man usually stood before a slender grill, occasionally wiping away beads of sweat as he fanned the flames that licked at the satay.

On this tiny island that just about touches the equator, we have only one season: summer. So, seasonal cuisine is nonexistent.

But among all the local dishes, satay always seemed more of a summery ritual than most.

It is a staple at events like family cookouts and outdoor dinner parties. And when the day's sweltering heat made way for the evening's light winds, someone often would suggest heading to Satay Club or some other hawker center for the sticks of chicken or beef (my favorites). You dipped them in spicy peanut sauce and chased them with crisp, sliced onions or cucumbers. And, in Singapore, the dish always is served with fragrant ketupat, firmly packed rice cakes wrapped in interwoven coconut or banana leaves.

My father had been going to Satay Club since it opened in the 1970s, and he always went to Stall No. 1, run by Fatman Satay. So, when my father started taking us, he always waved away the aggressive hawkers trying to flag us down to sit at their tables and headed straight for Fatman.

We didn't know Fatman - if there actually was a Fatman - but the satay he served was memorable. The minced meat was well-seasoned, tender, glistening with oil and hot off the grill. And our satay feast always was capped with a rush to count the sticks to see who had eaten the most. (Dad always won.)

As the years went by, my piles of sticks grew larger. And later, when I grew up and began the occasional satay jaunts with my friends, I would learn the divine pleasure of closing such a meal with a mug of piping hot teh halia - Malay ginger tea - the perfect antidote for the spicy stirrings in my tummy.

In the nine years that I've lived in America, I've sampled satay in Thai, pan-Asian and Malaysian restaurants in San Francisco, New York, Chicago and Portland, Ore. And except for one homey eatery in the heart of Washington - Malaysia Kopitiam near Dupont Circle - the satay experiences haven't come anywhere close to my days with Fatman.

But then again, that may just be because I haven't found a place where you can hear the satay calls long before you can smell it.