That might normally be enough for one night, but any beer visit to Bruges is forfeit unless as many visits as possible are made to what might be the best beer café in a land of many excellent beer cafés. Café ’t Brugs Beertje (Bruges’s Little Bear), run by the most magnificent of hosts, Daisy Claeys, specializes in Streekbieren (beers of the region). There are about 300 beers with five available on draft.
One other beer specialty restaurant in Bruges is Bierbrasserie Cambrinus. The restaurant has a list of 400 beers, eight on tap, in a historic building dating to 1699. Among many beer items on the menu, Cambrinus offers cheese croquette and salad made with Achel Trappist beer and Belgium’s famous carbonnade flamande made with Gulden Draak from Brouwerij Van Steenberge.
Brouwerij Rodenbach
About 25 miles south of Bruges is the small city of Roeselare, where the rococo city hall on the central market square dates from the 18th century. The city hall, market hall and the belfry have been declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
A famous brewery in Roeselare is Brouwerij Alexander Rodenbach, which dates to 1821 and is now part of the family-owned Palm Breweries (the other beer brands being Palm, Steenbrugge, Boon and Estaminet). Rodenbach is a specialty among specialties for Belgian beers, a sour, red beer blended from a mix of young beer and beer aged for two years in oak barrels. It’s during this aging that the beer is infused with aromas and flavors of at least eight strains of yeast and lactic acid bacteria.
The regular Rodenbach (5.2 percent ABV) is a blend of 75 percent young beer with 25 percent aged beer. Rodenbach Grand Cru (6.0 percent), much sharper on the palate, is a mix of about 33 percent young beer and about 67 percent aged beer. There are experiments ongoing at the brewery to produce a beer with a blend made from 3-year-old aged beer.
Belga Queen Ghent
Ghent is another medieval city, reminiscent of Bruges. But although a larger city, the Ghent historic city center seems smaller and quieter. It has all the charm of Bruges, but seemingly fewer tourists. Ghent is about 45 miles west and north of Roselaresee above.
The top beer restaurant in Ghent is Belga Queen, a concept restaurant for new Belgian gastronomy. There is another location in Brussels, both conceived by chef and restaurant designer Antoine Pinto. The focus of this concept is to prepare foods that are grown in Belgium—Belgian locavore. Pinto has a business relationship with Palm Breweries, so without fail his restaurants feature many Belgian beers and all of those brewed by Palm. Even the wines are Belgian in that they come from Belgian winegrowers around the world.
