ViaVia Traveler’s Café

UPDATE: Moved to the other side of the Vismet and got a new name: Au Bassin

ViaVia Traveler’s Café is not new, but its current location is. And what a difference it makes! We had visited ViaVia quite a few times before at its old location, and then it already was a very pleasant place, with a nice covered courtyard, and on sunny days a terrace on the sidewalk as well. But now, in addition to a courtyard — open this time — there are two more covered terraces. the barroom itself is a lot bigger than the old one as well.

When it comes to the beers and bites bit, it seems not much has changed so far: the menu is the same as before, or at least very similar.

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Luckily, the beer menu at ViaVia Traveler’s Café was quite nice already before the move: lots of De la Senne beer, Brussels Beer Project, Cantillon‘s gueuze, and a few beers from other small breweries.

The most interesting however, is the “Brewery of the Month” selection. ViaVia proposes its customers not just one, but usually four or five beers from an often unknown brewery. It’s an excellent way to discover the whole core range of a brewery in one session, which sometimes leads to quite pleasant discoveries.
This month’s brewery is Brasserie de l’Abbaye de Villers en Brabant, in case you were wondering.

On draught, the selection is less interesting: six of the seven taps are reserved for InBev beers — of which two Goose Island, they’re everywhere now — leaving one tap for Zinnebir fortunately.

Apart from the usual bar snacks, there is a small “big food” offering as well: soup, quiche, croque monsieur, and strangely enough, the section also lists cheesecake. This offer will most likely grow over time, since the new kitchen is a lot bigger and better equipped than the old one.

The food service come with a little novelty this time:  when you order something that takes some time to cook, you’ll receive a device that will start buzzing and blinking when your order is ready to pick up at the bar. It might be a tad less customer friendly than table service, but I can imagine, once all the seats inside and all three terraces fill up, it will be the only way to get everyone served.

In addition to all the new terraces, ViaVia now has an extra event space on top of the barroom, fitted with three additional taps. Right now the space is filled with a giant art installation, but when it’s finished — the bar apparently still needed some work done — I can imagine all kinds of parties, receptions and maybe even ceilidhs taking place there.

It’s not quite clear to me where the ‘traveller’ bit comes in. Okay, it’s part of Belgian travel agent Joker‘s worldwide chain of ViaVia Cafés, but there is no hotel attached, as is the case in a lot of the foreign ViaVia Cafés. There don’t seem to be more travellers or tourists than in any other bar in Brussels, no travel books yet, and apart from a lost globe or suitcase, there isn’t even much travel themed decoration. Admittedly, ViaVia reopened only three days before our visit, so some finishing touches might still be in order.

That being said, the place looks very nice already, and has retained everything that was good in the old place. Now there’s just a lot more space to enjoy it!

      

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tl;dr

Beers

• 7 beers on draught
  • Zinnebir
  • 2 Goose Island and 4 other InBev beers
• Not just one beer, but a whole “Brewery of the Month”
• Some other De la Senne beers on bottle, and Brussels Beer Project as well

Bites

• “Big food”
  • Soup
  • 2 different quiches
  • Croque monsieur
  • Cheesecake?
• “Small food”
  • Cheese, olives, nuts & crisps. No sausages though…

 

ViaVia Traveler's Café
Baksteenkaai 74 Quai aux Briques
1000 Brussel
+32 472 03 55 77
http://www.viavia.brussels

 

What have people been drinking here recently?