Restaurant review – Brasserie Le Couvent, Waterloo

Hubs and I racked up to this brasserie during the week. It is always busy – a good sign – and the couple of times I’ve eaten there have not disappointed.

The menu is ample, covering a wide range of salads, fish, meats and pastas. There is something for everyone. It is mainly Belgian cuisine with a nod to Italy. Starters are around €13-14 and mains range from €14-25.

The restaurant itself is cosy; modern and slick are not the first words I would use to describe it. It is however a very nice Belgian brasserie and the kind of place in which I could happily spend a few hours. The service is very good. When we went there was one guy managing the floor of about seven or eight tables. The one drawback was that the tables are quite close together and we could overhear our neighbours.

So, onto the food. Both of us ordered the shrimp croquettes (€13.50). I didn’t get a photo of these as we were starving, so we dived in. I can say that they were delicious, served with a small side salad, and deliciously crunchy and melty and really, really hot.

We both ordered the bacon burger (€16) too and … well, I’d had it before but I wanted to double check but … <<deep breath>> this could be the best burger I’ve had in Belgium. The meat (beef I think) is well cooked and tasty and not greasy, there is enough cheese without overpowering the meat and the bacon is a proper English style thick slice. They include a slightly spicy ketchup/mayonnaise sauce on the burger, and it really is a perfect balance of wet to dry ingredients. I eat my burgers with my hands, and this one stayed intact until the last bite, which is a big plus. The chips are not homemade, but they are well cooked, again not greasy and nice and crunchy.

The bacon burger and chips from the Brasserie du Couvent

We had a Waterloo blonde (triple) beer to wash down all of this. It’s 7.5% and comes in its own ceramic ‘glass’. It is a very tasty, well rounded, soft flavoured beer, but it is quite strong.

To finish, I had the selection of desserts with the café gourmand. It included a chocolate mousse, an éclair and a crème brulee. Yum. We paid €77 in total for the two of us, which was very good value for the quality of the food we got. I will definitely go back.

Rue du Couvent, 7
1410 Waterloo
Tél / Fax: 02/351.38.34
E-mail: info@brasserieducouvent.be
open 7 days, lunchtime and evenings.

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