If you love food, you’ll love Brussels. Restaurants abound and include every type of food imaginable. And no visit to Belgium is complete with out several stops for waffles! Here are some of the many restaurants we ate at during our travels to Brussels.
While in Brussels, we used the Hop On Hop Off bus to do a city tour. We also took a few tours outside the city. Many of the tours we took got us back to Brussels somewhere between seven and eight o’clock in the evening. This is perfect dining time for Europeans. This was late for us, but we quickly adapted. One of the things we learned was that our hotel, the Brussels Marriott Hotel Grand Place, was in a great location for restaurants.
The Grand-Place of Brussels is an enormous square with lots to do and photogenic buildings. Not surprisingly, the Grand-Place has a large selection of restaurants. It also was a short walk from our hotel to these restaurants. We recommend a centrally located hotel so you can easily walk to numerous dining options.
Brussels Grill Grand Place
The Brussels Grill Grand Place is situated along side many other competing restaurants near the Grand-Place. We saw plenty of diners and checked out the menu. Madeline wanted a salad, and I wanted a hamburger, and the restaurant offered both.
The place was packed and after about 20 minutes, we saw an English couple who couldn’t find a table. We were at a four-person table, so we offered to share. Their journey to Brussels was much easier than ours; they took the train from London. However, they said that it took longer to get to London from where they lived than it took to get to Brussels from London. Everyone has their interesting travel stories! They enjoyed a beer while we finished our meal, and then we wished each other well.
Known as a steakhouse, the Brussels Grill offers plenty of food choices beyond steak and many great beers. But great beer is everywhere in Brussels. We’d go back to this restaurant, but there were more to try!
Le Grec
We found Restaurant Le Grec while looking for Manneken Pis, a statue of a little boy peeing into a fountain.
After finding Manneken Pis, we were hungry, and lucky for us there was a charming Greek restaurant nearby. It was adjacent to the Delirium Village, which has Jeanneke Pis, the sister of the peeing boy.
Madeline and I love Greek food. The first questions we asked was if they had gyros and a Greek salad. Both answers were yes. Then we asked if they had Stella Artois. This Belgium beer is well known outside of Belgium, but we hadn’t seen many restaurants offering it. The answer again was yes.
We decided to stay. We were glad we did. The food was tasty, and the portions were large. The service was great. We felt like we had been invited into a Greek family gathering. Brussels restaurants can be more expensive than you might think, but Le Grec was much less expensive. The quality was great, but the prices were lower. We heartily recommend this restaurant after you visit Mannekin Pis or Jeanneke Pis.
Aux Gaufre de Bruxelles
We visited Aux Gaufre de Bruxelles because Madeline wanted Belgium waffles. Our hotel had them every morning, but they were the self-serve kind, where you poured the batter into a waffle iron. And she wanted it served to her with strawberries, whipped cream and chocolate.
Yes, Belgium is famous for its waffles. We saw lots of tourists wandering around with their waffle concoctions all over the Grand-Place. Madeline didn’t want to walk around with a waffle, so we stopped at Aux Gaufre de Bruxelles in the area of Grand-Place. We found that it also offered pasta dishes, sandwiches and, of course, gigantic waffles.
I had the Bolognese dish; Madeline enjoyed her waffle. The Aux Gaufre de Bruxelles feels like a French bistro. There is no seating inside that we could see. All the service was for outdoor tables.
The Midtown Grill is a great American-style steakhouse in Brussels. They are open for breakfast, lunch and dinner. It’s located in the Brussels Marriott Hotel Grand Place, which is a great place to stay. We made it our Brussels base.
We are premium tier members of Marriott and have been for a long time. Breakfast was free for us, and it was a very nice buffet. There was an egg station, and the chef could make just about anything you want. The staff greeted us each day by name after the first day. And the service was excellent, along with the food.
When we got back to the hotel after a day of exploration, we saw that the Midtown was always busy. A lot of locals and tourists came for a good meal. We’d recommend it.