There are plenty of bars in Brussels with a foreign touch — or more than just a touch — but only some are truly international. And by that I mean a bar where you can find beers from all over the world, but very local beers as well, and where you can hear the corresponding languages spoken. At The Black Sheep, the Lanterne from the Ixellois brewery L’Ermitage, pouring alongside the IPA from the American brewery in Berlin Stone, illustrates this perfectly.
Brussels Beer Project
L’Atelier
UPDATE: Closed permanently…
From the outside, L’Atelier must be one of the most unattractive bars in Brussels, hiding its treasures behind a bland garage door, without any windows to peek into. Too often, for unknown reasons, that garage door even stays closed! If the door is open however, don’t hesitate to go inside, forget about the outside world for a couple of hours, and go treasure hunting in this Aladdin’s cave of beer, in the student district in Ixelles.
La Biche
We’re quite used to finding beers from one or more of the Brussels breweries on the menu of a bar, and as we’ve said before: it’s a good indication someone put some effort in the beer selection. Even if the rest of the (online available) beer menu is not that exciting at all, it always makes us curious to see if there are any interesting guest beers. When we spotted Stone IPA on the Facebook page of La Biche, a visit was unavoidable. However, what we then spotted on the guest beer menu above the bar, was above all our expectations for this little neighbourhood bar!
Brussels Beer Project
It’s quite nice to have a brewery with a little shop only a few minutes’ walk from home, to provide us with a steady supply of freshly bottled beers. Add a real taproom open in the evening — actually quite a rarity in Brussels — and growler filling station, and visits become more frequent and lengthy. The one thing saving us from spending too much time and money at Brussels Beer Project, is that they’re not open every day: only on Thursday, Friday and Saturday, from 2 to 10pm. When you happen to be in the neighbourhood within those hours, don’t hesitate to have a seat on one of the beer crate stools with the hissing malt bag cushions, and taste their newest experimental brew, or one of the guest beers.
Merlo
Now the last Winter Wonder chalets have finally been taken down, it’s once again possible to see café Merlo from our doorstep, and in a time when long journeys by tram and metro are undesirable — some bloggers have to spend a bit more time studying for exams now — a quick visit to our near-neighbours was almost unavoidable. ‘t Verzet‘s Super NoAH turned out to be the Beer of the Month on bottle, so we crossed the Vismet for a hoppy nightcap.
Peck 47
The Kiekenmarkt or Rue du Marché aux Poulets received a makeover in 2012, making it car-free and therefore much more attractive for everyone, but businesses in the food and drink industry in particular. Sure, Corica en Celtica fared quite well already, when there was only a three tile wide pavement in front of their doors, but the street’s renaissance attracted some new entrepreneurs as well. We already told the success story of Bia Mara, but a couple of doors up the street, Peck 47 has become a food and drink hot spot as well!
Saco Pizza Bar
We’ve already taken you to a real Italian restaurant with this blog, but so far, we hadn’t yet mentioned the Italian fast food par excellence: pizza. There are dozens of pizza places in Brussels, but as often is the case with fast food places, serving good beer is rarely a priority there. A happy exception to this rule is Saco Pizza Bar, serving both great pizzas, and an excellent selection of Belgian beers.
Houtsiplou
Burgers and beer are an excellent combination, we have mentioned that before. Not everybody likes burgers though, or at least not all the time. Luckily, at Houtsiplou the menu consist of more than just burgers, offering a range of classic Belgian dishes and some others as well. Your dining partner prefers beef carpaccio over beef burgers? No problem here!
Beer Mania
There are many beer stores in Brussels, but only a few make an effort to differentiate themselves from the rest. Beer Mania does so in two different ways: firstly, you can have a cold beer and a meal there, and even quite late. Secondly, they have their own beer, available nowhere else. We had visited Beer Mania already a couple of years ago, but our beer buying interests have since then moved from the mostly Belgian beers on offer there. When they announced a Finnish beer festival however, we saw it as an excellent reason to return.
Excelsior
Most of the places we’ve discussed so far, are found in the same areas: Brussels centre, Saint-Gilles, Ixelles, Schaerbeek. A little while ago we were involved in a little Twitter conversation about the lack of decent beer places west of the canal. We had to admit, apart from some breweries, we only knew of one: Excelsior, in Jette. But this bar could easily fool you with its huge Jupiler and Maes branding on the outside, and even inside, the only visible pump clip is once again on of those commercial pilsners. But once you peek into the fridges, things get a whole lot more interesting…