cakephp - best way to make a dynamic menu

I want to display a menu on every page that is run from a database. Using just down and dirty php thats easy but I want to integrate it with cakephp using their MVC system.
Now my question is how is the best way to go about this?

My thoughts are to make an element with the layout and then a component or controller for all the logic. Any Suggestions on this? Or is a Helper what i want to use?

I also need to get all the data from multiple tables in the database. Is it best to do all my data collecting logic through one model? Or do most of it in the menu controller (or component) and use the models for each table?

Thank you,

Walter