Oh, yes, 沙爹 is phonetic too! I've edited that in, thanks.
沙茶醬 is different from satay sauce; "barbecue sauce" would probably be a better translation, or just "shacha sauce". The photo on that Wikipedia page is what I know as 沙茶醬; it's a grainy, oily sauce made from dried fish, garlic, spices, etc. Here's a blog post about it.
Re Canton/Guǎngdōng, yes, I'd wondered about that too. Wikipedia says: It is believed that the romanisation "Canton" originated from the Portuguese Cantão, which was transcribed from Guangdong. Nevertheless, because at the time of the Portuguese arrival, the capital city had no specific appellation other than Sheng Cheng (省城, lit. the provincial capital) by its people, the province name was adopted for the walled city by the Europeans.
Though the same article also says that the Portuguese didn't turn up until 1514, and it implies (it's not entirely clear) that the city had the name Guangzhou from some time after 226 AD; it says it took the name "gradually", but even "gradually" implies faster than 13 centuries. So unless people stopped calling it Guangzhou and then started again, the passage above about the capital city not having a name doesn't seem to make sense.
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沙茶醬 is different from satay sauce; "barbecue sauce" would probably be a better translation, or just "shacha sauce". The photo on that Wikipedia page is what I know as 沙茶醬; it's a grainy, oily sauce made from dried fish, garlic, spices, etc. Here's a blog post about it.
Re Canton/Guǎngdōng, yes, I'd wondered about that too. Wikipedia says:
Though the same article also says that the Portuguese didn't turn up until 1514, and it implies (it's not entirely clear) that the city had the name Guangzhou from some time after 226 AD; it says it took the name "gradually", but even "gradually" implies faster than 13 centuries. So unless people stopped calling it Guangzhou and then started again, the passage above about the capital city not having a name doesn't seem to make sense.