restaurant review #362 – Well, most of the times it’s good! Sometimes it’s not so good … Ludo is a vegan restaurant in the city center of Ghent, near the Vrijdagsmarkt. I was eager to go check out this place, it’s always fun to discover new vegan places! We were here at the end of December 2022 on a Saturday for lunch.
Restaurant review #301 – Monkey eleven is a rather new place in town, it opened nearly two years ago, in the beginning of 2020. There are several vegan options standardly available. The style is of ‘healthy fastfood’. Each section of the menu has a vegan option (vegan pizza, wrap, bowl).
restaurant review #263 – This review is from a restaurant visit to Postbar a couple of months ago, just before the lockdown measures due to the COVID19 pandemic started. Postbar opened in 2019, in the Langestraat, on the East side of Bruges. It’s a small breakfast/lunch bar, with several postcards for sale which one can write on site and also post there. Postbar is on the corner and has a bright interior, with some relax chairs as well. There is always a vegan option available. We had vegan soup (pea soup – the bread is vegan and vegan butter available, 6€). And toast with vegetable spread, which came with a nice and colourful salad on the side (8€).
Restaurant review #41 – Texel is an island north west of Amsterdam. There are only a handfull of small villages on Texel, but the island is very touristic, so there are quite a lot of hotels and restaurants. Not that much options for vegans though. In another blogpost, I’ll give our vegan view on Texel, and places where you can have a vegan meal (and also some restaurants that replied they can’t fullfill our vegan needs). We were at Texel for the weekend, and on one of those days, we dined at restaurant Opduin in De Koog, a very small town on the west side of the island. Every Saturday evening, restaurant Opduin serves an Indonesian rice table (besides the regular menu). I had inquired in advance if we could get a vegan Indonesian ricetable (explaining what we do and don’t eat) and got confirmation. So we made a reservation. When arriving at the restaurant, the waitress said she was told it would be difficult to get a vegan ricetable. Duh? I told her I had gotten confirmation beforehand and asked …
Restaurant review #21 – Chances are you’ve probably been in one of the many establishments worldwide of Le Pain Quotidien. Or at least you’ve seen one of them! There is also one in the heart of Bruges, near the central market place and the Burg. Pain Quotidien is French for Daily Bread. They sell a wide variety of bread over the counter, and you can also sit down for breakfast, lunch or just a coffee with some baked goodies. The restaurant always has one large communal table (for 10 people or more), but also other tables for 2 if you want to have a more private conversation. There’s always something vegan available and vegan items are clearly marked on the menu card. Le Pain Quotidien confirmed to us that the bread served at the table is always vegan. Most of the breads sold over the counter are also vegan, but the raisin bread (kramiek), sugar bread and brioche are non-vegan. UPDATE – see below We were at Le Pain Quotidien in Bruges for lunch on a Friday, and the …
Restaurant review #17 – There are some reviews you wish you didn’t have to write. This is one of them. Grenoble is a vegetarian restaurant in Sint-Niklaas, a city in Eastern Flanders, about 75 km from Bruges. The restaurant is located close to the market place of Sint-Niklaas. Restaurant Grenoble does not have an a la carte menu, just soup of the day (2,50€) a plat du jour (small size 10€ or regular size 11€) and dessert (2,50€). We telephoned beforehand to check whether we could get a vegan menu, and that was said to be no problem. We made a reservation for lunch at 1.30 PM on a Sunday (an earlier time wasn’t possible, they were fully booked for lunch). Sunday lunch We were there at 1.30 PM sharp (by that time quite hungry!) and the restaurant was still nearly full. Most people had finished lunch though. We asked the waiter what the soup of the day was, and it was said to be “vegetable soup”. I wouldn’t expect anything else than vegetable soup in a vegetarian restaurant, would …
Restaurant review #16 – De Bron is the only vegetarian restaurant in Bruges. It is located in the south of the city center, near the Beguinage and the Minnewaterpark . It is only open during weekdays for lunch, and offers a soup of the day and a plat du jour, which can be ordered in different sizes: baby, mini, medium and super size. Main dishes are veganized upon request. Desserts are mainly non-vegan, except for the soy vanilla pudding. There are also fresly pressed juices available. Most of what’s served in De Bron is organic. They also offer take-away lunch (orders must be placed before 11.30). Lunch We have been to the Bron several times over the last couple of years. On our last visit in March 2014, we had the soup of the day (2€), which happened to be vegan that day (carrot and chard). I went for the mini-size plat du jour (10,5€), my partner had the medium size dish (11€), which is already a fairly big portion. The plat du jour mostly consists of grains and a selection …
Restaurant review #9 – Restaurant Réliva is – so far as we know – the only restaurant in Bruges which has a vegan 3-course menu standardly available. It is not a vegan restaurant, but vegan is always on offer, and besides the 3-course vegan menu, there is sometimes also another vegan suggestion. We already visited Réliva in the Summer of 2013 (see our previous review here). And we liked it! (see edit below) We recently went again for lunch (February 2014). We were there first, but the place soon filled up and was nearly full for lunch. So we suggest you definitely make a reservation (we overheard the waitress telling some other people it was already fully booked for dinner that night). Both of the main courses of the ‘veggie’ menu were vegan so we could each have something different. We got a little appetizer of mushroom creme and basil with our drinks. And some bread and olive oil. This was our 3-course menu (35€): Pumpkin chestnut soup (organic) with some brandy and liquorice * Lasagne …
restaurant review #7 – Restaurant Komkommertijd in Ghent is probably the best know vegan restaurant in Belgium (there are in fact only 3 vegan restos in Belgium). Komkommertijd literally translates as ‘cucumber time‘, a period where there is not much news to report and not much happening. The word possibly originates in 17th century England, referring to the period when there was hardly any business for tailors, because when the cucumbers were in season the gentry left town for the countryside and business was slow for them. Business is definitely not slow at Komkommertijd in Ghent. It is highly recommended to make a reservation, because every time we’ve been there, the place is packed. The restaurant has an all you can eat vegan buffet, with soup, warm and cold dishes and also a dessert (most often a piece of cake). At lunchtime, you pay 13,50€ for the buffet, in the evening and during the weekend it’s 16€. You can go and fill your plate as many times as you want, so this is definitely the place to go if you …
Restaurant review #5 – Brasserie Forestière in Bruges lists some vegetarian options on their menu. I had already enjoyed a vegan wrap with tofu when I was there for a work lunch, so we decided to go check it out for dinner. Before going there for dinner, we had asked whether it was possible to get a vegan menu (explaining what this means), and chef Kenny assured us this wouldn’t be a problem, and that certain items on the menu could be adapted à la minute (e.g. leaving dairy items out of the dish). Forestière doesn’t serve any desserts though, only starters (or soup) and a main dish. Forestière is located close to the theater (schouwburg), in the center of Bruges. Upon being seated, we immediately noticed the wide space between the tables. Contrary to many other brasseries or bistros, Forestière is not jam-packed with tables and chairs (they could at least add 10 more tables), and that gives a nice feeling of spaciousness. It gives you some breathing space and you don’t have to …