Our Brussels food bucket list (and we ate it all)
We dedicated an entire Brussels trip to eating, with a list to tick off. Mission accomplished, waistbands tested. Here’s the bucket list, all twelve, in roughly the order you should attempt them.
1. Frites from a real friterie
Start here. A cone of double-fried chips from Maison Antoine or Frit Flagey, with proper sauce, eaten standing up (best frites). The benchmark.
2. A proper waffle (both kinds)
A light Brussels waffle and a chewy Liège waffle, both plain, no sugar towers (the debate).
3. Pralines from a maker
Fresh pralines from Marcolini, Neuhaus or Laurent Gerbaud — not the tourist shops (best chocolate).
4. Moules-frites in Sainte-Catherine
The national dish, in season, in the seafood quarter (where).
5. A gueuze at Cantillon
Sour lambic where it’s made — the most distinctly Brussels thing you can drink (Cantillon).
6. Carbonnade flamande
Beef slow-braised in Belgian beer — the great comfort dish (Belgian dishes).
7. Shrimp croquettes
Croquettes aux crevettes grises — crisp shells, tiny North Sea shrimp. A genuine delicacy.
8. A Trappist beer in a brown café
A Westmalle Tripel or Chimay Blue in a wood-panelled café (beer bars).
9. Stoemp
Rustic mash with veg and a sausage, in a Marolles café — humble and lovely.
10. Speculoos, somehow
The spiced biscuit, as a biscuit, a spread, or flavouring a dessert. Everywhere, and you’ll get hooked.
11. A vol-au-vent
Old-school creamy chicken-and-mushroom pastry — generous and comforting.
12. A dame blanche
Finish with the classic vanilla-ice-cream-and-hot-chocolate sundae.
How to do it efficiently
You can’t eat all this in a day without consequences. Spread it over a weekend, and shortcut the search with a food tour on day one — a food tour knocks out half the list while teaching you where the locals go. Then pick off the rest yourself.
The golden rules throughout: buy from makers, eat one street back from the Grand-Place, and pace the beer (Belgian dishes). Do that, and Brussels turns out to be one of the great eating cities in Europe — and this list is the proof. We regret nothing.
