We should have known better than to come to a big bar on the liveliest square of Saint-Gilles on a Friday evening… But we just tried to ignore the plastic cups, loud music and ID-less bouncers, and focussed on the surprisingly rich beer menu of Café Maison du Peuple instead. We didn’t just discover beers from De la Senne, Brussels Beer Project and Beerstorming from — very — nearby, but even bottles and cans from Stone, BrewDog and The Kernel from abroad!
The unilingually named Café Maison du Peuple is just the bar part of the old art nouveau Maison du Peuple or Volkshuis (People’s House), built in the early 1900’s, for the benefit of the working class, so they could have a place to meet, and participate in cultural activities or political debates. For example, Lenin held a speech here in 1914.
All but two of the nine pumps pour InBev-beers — Café Maison du Peuple apparently is one of the few places that still serves Goose IPA — so the excellent choice of guest beers is all the more surprising. The one non-InBev beer that managed to conquer a coveted permanent place at the pumps, is Jambe-de-Bois. Temporarily it was accompanied by Brussels Calling, the suggested draught beer of the moment.
The huge antipasti dish on the table next to us looked quite appealing, but not aware of the food menu, we ate just before heading to Café Maison du Peuple. You can eat here all day, apparently, from breakfast in the morning, to soups, salads, quiches, paninis, lasagnes and croques until 10 in the evening.
Café Maison du Peuple is on the car-free square Parvis de Saint-Gilles, which almost turns into one big terrace on sunny days like today. Don’t worry too much about sitting on the right terrace though, this bar isn’t the only one with an interesting beer selection on the square, so you can expect some more blog posts about this area!
tl;dr
Beers
- 9 beers on draught
- Jambe-de-Bois
- Suggestion
- Interesting selection of bottles (and cans), both local and foreign
Bites
- Breakfast
- Soups, salads, quiches, paninis, lasagnes & croques
Café Maison du Peuple
Sint-Gillisvoorplein 37 Parvis de Saint-Gilles
1060 Brussel
+32 2 850 09 08
http://www.maison-du-peuple.be
cafemdp
What have people been drinking here recently?
- Patrick Vanbeggelaer is drinking a Saison van de Bruwer at Café Maison du Peuple
- Laurent Van Begin is drinking a La Fractale at Café Maison du Peuple
- Marc Tagnesi is drinking a La Fractale at Café Maison du Peuple
- Matthew Kast is drinking a Leffe Blonde / Blond at Café Maison du Peuple
- Amélie Kinkin is drinking a Delta IPA at Café Maison du Peuple
- Kjell is drinking a Tripel Bertha at Café Maison du Peuple
- Kjell is drinking a Bière de Miel Biologique at Café Maison du Peuple
- Alex Couric is drinking a Stella Artois at Café Maison du Peuple
- Thomas Andersson is drinking a Delta IPA at Café Maison du Peuple
- Axel Wohlfahrt is drinking a BMX IPA at Café Maison du Peuple