On the Road with Casual Kitchen: Belgium a Volonte

A couple of weeks ago, Laura and I visited Belgium for the very first time, and I wanted to share with you three simple food-related tips for navigating this wonderful country:

1) Drink beer,
2) Eat chocolate,

And most importantly:

3) If you see the words "à volonté" written outside a restaurant, go in.

Just as the four greatest words in the English language are "all you can eat," the two greatest words in, uh, Walloon are "à volonté." And the greatest culinary experience we had in Belgium, and indeed the greatest all-you-can-eat experience I'll ever have in my entire life (that is, until somebody invents all-you-can-eat dark chocolate) was at a little restaurant in Ghent called Amadeus.

We're not talking an overcooked $6.95 Chinese buffet here. This restaurant sold ribs--barbecued ribs--that were as good as anything I've had in the American south. And they kept bringing more, and more... and more.


I wanted to grab the waiter by the shirt and tell him that he lived in paradise, but I was unable to get out of my chair.

And then came dessert. I had a spectacular chocolate mousse that was as good as Paul Prudhomme's recipe, and Laura and our Belgian friend had the coupe dame blanche, which we call in American an "ice cream sundae." Only it sounds even more delicious in French, doesn't it?


You can't eat like this too often, for obvious reasons. But if you're a disciplined and healthy eater most of the time, it's okay, occasionally, to drop your guard once in a while and really pig out.

There were only two (minor) disappointments that evening. First, I just couldn't find an open walk-in angioplasty clinic anywhere in town. And it wasn't even that late.

Second, Laura only finished off one and a half racks of ribs. I know she could have done better.

Related Links:
Amadeus Restaurant (locations in Ghent, Brussels and Antwerp)
The Xenophobe's Guide to the Belgians (I highly recommend this amusing mini-guidebook for anyone interested in visiting Belgium)

Related Posts:
Ten Strategies to Stop Mindless Eating
Ten Rules for the Modern Restaurant-Goer
The Chocolate Gene



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Carolina Barbecue!

Today's post is about that uniquely American food, barbecue. Specifically Carolina Barbecue, which we lustily ate last week on the way to our vacation on the North Carolina shore.

My secret for finding solid barbecue is this: wherever we're staying, I ask the girl at the checkout desk (in this case it was the Hampton Inn in Edenton, NC--and it was quite nice and clean by the way) what her favorite barbecue place is. She told me to head over to Captain Bob's about 15 miles away in Hertford, NC.


We knew this place would be great the minute we saw the cheap chairs, formica tables and paper placemats.


Heck, my hopes started soaring the minute I saw the gravel parking lot full of American-made cars.


Sure, NYC has its BBQ places, most notably, Virgil's and Blue Smoke, but there's something deeply irritating about paying $100 for dinner for two. It just doesn't seem appropriate to charge that much for barbecue--it kind of ruins the vibe (I'm thinking about Blue Smoke specifically here, Virgil's is a bit more reasonably priced).

Better to spend $19.89 for dinner for two (okay, it was $25.00 including tip) at Cap'n Bob's for some of the best BBQ we've had in a while, complete with delicious hush puppies and of course, mooshy beans!


Keep in mind, we're now on vacation from our normal diet, which is based primarily on quasi-vegetarianism. Thus there's just nothing like sitting down to a big plate of shredded meat with a bottle of Texas Pete's in hand. Some might call this just another example of mindless eating, but I see this as more of an example of following Rule #10: Let down your guard once in a while.

And of course I can't leave out that this $25.00 dinner also included a 2,000 calorie slab of peanut butter pie. Calling it a "piece" of pie would be a gross understatement. I could tell by the glint in her eye that Laura was only going to let me have a very small taste.