A man walks into a bar, followed behind by his daughter. They exchange a few words in muttered French. A couple ahead of them – man with his arm in a sling, woman fussing over the drinks menu – order their beers in Dutch and take a seat at a rickety wooden table. This is La Charnière, a rudimentary café housed in an 18th century Brussels farmhouse
Read MoreI don’t like mushrooms. Oh, no. I hate them*. You will never see a beer and food pairing involving on this site**. This distaste for fungus did not stop me from meeting with Champignons de Bruxelles – Brussels entrepreneurs cultivating mushrooms on the spent grains of Brasserie Cantillon, in the bowels of Anderlecht’s slaughterhouse.
Read MoreIn all the years I’ve lived in Brussels, and as long as Cantillon have been organising their annual Zwanze celebration, I’ve never been organised enough to buy tickets for the main event at Moeder Lambic Fontainas before they have sold out. 2017 was no different. That is how we found ourselves schlepping up the hills of St. Gilles on Saturday evening to the original Moeder Lambic.
Read MoreWant to know how to survive the Belgian Beer Weekend, the annual bacchanalia on Brussels' Grand Place? Then read on...
Read MoreThe Brussels new wave beer scene continues apace. First cam the beer bars. Then came the breweries. And now it is the turn of the beer festivals. After the Swaff festival in July, this weekend it is the turn of the BXLBeerFest, what will be the largest beer festival dedicated to small, independent (craft, even) breweries organised in Brussels.
Over bottles of Orval at A la Mort Subite, Kevin Desmet – a.k.a. the Belgian Beer Geek – told me about the background to the festival, Brussels beer compromises, and why they think you should go to BXLBeerFest.
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