PROFILE BY BEST RESTAURANTS
Themed restaurants and bars are not everyone's cup of tea or pint of Pils. This Belgium-inspired joint however is restrained enough in novelty to ease in those curious to explore its tucker and tipples. There is little kitsch among the antique wooden furniture, floorboards and warm lighting. A bar stocked with gleaming glasses screaming to be filled with beer welcomes all in.
Being in Rundle Street, during the Clipsal 500 V8 racing season this ode to Oostende sees its 40 styles of beer being sucked up by the petrol-guzzling-race-car fraternity of Australia. As for Adelaide's Mad March, with its revered gluttony of festivals of folk getting their freak on, you could sidle up to this bar in leather lederhosen to sample its biere, and no-one would look sideways.
With a nod to the Belgian beauties both bottled and on-tap, it is the food here that garners the most interest from this little black duck. "Duo de canard" confits a leg and roasts a shank of this bird, it perched on a plate with hand-made gnocchi, sautéed chard, and leek and almond cream. My "waterzooi" experience to date has been of the chicken-prepared-with-arteries-full-of-butter variety (and I am not complaining). Here it is of another traditional preparation with its creamy bisque flaunting seafood. If you succumb to the "when in Rome" sentiment then I suggest you take your steaming kilogram pot of mussels with the Paddestoel broth of white wine, garlic, mushrooms, spring onion, cracked pepper, cream and truffle oil. Loosen those lederhosen.
Roz Taylor