Gent

As with all trendy restaurants, chef Kim Devisschere operates on emotion and season: the menu is unique, changing every lunchtime and evening, like an invitation to culinary discovery. For a lunch menu, you can try lacquered veal cheeks, followed by brandade de morue au cognac, roasted carrots and chickpeas, and conclude with a nectarine cheesecake. In the evening, prices are higher but the menu is just as creative and spectacular. Vegetarian options are also available. Reservations are essential, as places are scarce.

The concept of this wash bar is to combine the useful with the pleasurable, or even the choreable with the pleasurable, as you watch your laundry run while enjoying a bagel or a slice of toast and listening to the gentle hum of the drums. If you're tired of washing your jeans with hotel soaps, don't bother! The sofas are soft, and the menu is plastered on the bottom of old drawers overlooking the tiled counter. Salads, bagels and burgers are packed with colorful, tasty vegetables, fresh, healthy, affordable, central and inevitably trendy.

Here, culinary specialties are served with Orval beer. And it's around Karel Van der Cruyssen that the restaurant forges its identity: First World War hero, priest then abbot(abt in Flemish) and, above all, creator of the famous local beer. No wonder the restaurant serves an entire menu based on this beverage (yes, yes, even the dessert!). You'll also be able to try the only Flemish chicken-based carbonnades, which are lighter and tastier. In summer, enjoy the sunny terrace, and in winter, the central fireplace.

There's nothing pretentious about Uncle Babe's, just a fine menu of gourmet burgers served on old-fashioned, enameled oval soup plates that hold huge portions. The bar is dressed in copper, and it's more than pleasant to settle your stomach with these behemoths topped with good meat and hand-picked noble ingredients. On the other hand, prices remain very reasonable, making this a highly recommended address. The menu also includes a number of fine salads. In the evening, continue with a glass of wine or a cocktail.

You will find the same sign in Ghent and Brussels. Amadeus' specialty: spare ribs at will. Trendy brewery atmosphere, with a busy decoration, with checkered tablecloths... The wine, payable according to what you drink from the bottle ("à la ficelle", as they say in Belgium), is certainly not a grand cru, but the formula seems to be a great success. Instead, we suggest that you choose a bottle to accompany ribs with honey and spices, which you will find difficult to finish on the first plate.

This is one of Ghent's most popular restaurants. Oak's contemporary cuisine draws inspiration from the world's best recipes to create fresh seasonal dishes using emulsions, glazes and other sophisticated transformations to create subtle flavors. The menu is fixed and changes daily according to Chef Marcelo's inspiration. The elaborate menu is difficult to decipher in Dutch, so simply let your taste buds guide you and enjoy. Reservations essential, as this is a sought-after table.

The people of Ghent flock here every Sunday. It's a real old-fashioned kiosk, but where flowers and newspapers have given way to a veritable oyster bar, where you can enjoy oysters standing up or at the counter, accompanied by a glass of wine. This is the heart of Ghent. It's the place to meet and strut your stuff on the Kouter. The oysters, on the other hand, come from France, not from Belgium. But who cares, we'll have a few fines de claires d'Oléron with a good dry white wine to fill up on vitamins and iodine.

The trendy, gourmet Belgian pizzeria chain has opened a restaurant in Ghent. The particularity: the dough is made with beer yeast, and the topping combinations are surprising, some of them veggie. The restaurant offers a beer pairing with the menu, or how to choose the best Belgian beer to go with the chosen pizza. Inside, admire the bricks dating back to the inn's ^17th-century construction, and the woodwork and green plants that contrast with the industrial loft look of the walls.

Ghent is a city where vegetarianism is developing at a high gastronomic level. This establishment opened in 2017 proves it: during the day, you can have a coffee or a tea, but at noon it is the salads that attract the locals for a vegetarian break. You can try for example the Boon: lettuce - white rice - beans - daikon - pomegranate seeds - tofu - Chinese cabbage - edamame - fried onions - soy sauce. A real pleasure, in a nice warm and trendy setting. The whole at really democratic prices. You can quickly make it your lunchtime canteen.

Here you are in the^2nd living room of a couple who know how to handle vegetarian ingredients with delight and beauty. It's also ethically conscious, since, as its name suggests, the restaurant is locavore, sourcing from local biodynamic farms according to the seasons. It's a cool, intimate Brooklyn-style place, with democratic prices and delicious plates. The weekly menu includes soup, bruschetta with hummus, salad, quiche, gratin and a veggie burger. You'll quickly make it your favorite cantine.