Hello from sunny Belgium!
Hi!
We are in the stunning town of Bruges and when I think about Belgium
the first thing I think about is all the food.
And I know Marc loves beer.
The beer.
So today we’re going out in search of the waffles, the fries, the chocolate, and the beer.
Yeah.
We are kicking off this epic Belgian food tour with chocolate.
The way to do it.
We got a great tip from our lovely Airbnb host.
She said there are over 120 chocolate places in Bruges.
My kind of town.
And then she said, “They’re not all good.”
So obviously we wanted to try the best one.
She said B by B which is right in front of us right now is the place to go.
And apparently it was started by a Michelin chef.
-Yeah. So you know it’s gonna be insanely good.
It’s like conceptual chocolate but it’s also traditional.
So it’s like old world Belgian chocolate meets new world Michelin star chef.
I’m listening.
And it’s right in front of us and I can’t wait to try this.
Slight change of plans.
We went up to the door and there was a big sign that said that they’re actually
in the market square today of all days.
Some special event happening.
So they’re making us work for it a little bit but you know what?
That’s ok.
Our chocolate game is strong and we’re motivated.
I’d say of all things that motivates us it’s chocolate.
We will find you, Designer Belgian Chocolates, and when we do we will eat you.
So many ups and downs today.
Not only is it not closed and at the market hall - it’s a whole event of chocolate.
Oh my god.
We’re at a chocolate event by accident in Belgium.
Thank you, God.
Wait a minute.
Perfect.
Now the concept is that we flavour chocolate with flavours in the way of milk or pure or white
it’s always flavoured with something.
And every combination is a number and every number has a little box.
There are two kinds of combinations: it’s a balance or it’s a push up.
Number three is a balance.
Why?
Rhubarb is kind of sour but the violet makes it smooth and round.
Ok.
Ok?
Ok…
(Overlapping audio - details about the science behind these chocolates)
It’s blown up with nitrogen.
Whoa.
If you blow it up with nitrogen, normally white is a bit sticky in the mouth
but now with 80% of nitrogen - so air - you don’t have that.
So it’s gone in two seconds and what stays in your mouth are the flavours.
The science of chocolate.
I’m going to ask you to take a piece.
Ok.
And put it in one time in your mouth.
Don’t bite in it.
If you bite in it, I bite in you.
Ok.
There you go.
And now GO.
Mmm!
You will not find a preparation like that here.
What’s it doing?
Now stay calm, will you?
I take it it’s hard to stay calm.
I don’t think I’ve ever tasted something like that
or had flavour that felt like it was slowly being... like air being let out of a balloon.
That’s a good way to describe it.
Like it was almost like the air pockets, as they slowly compressed,
it released the flavour slowly.
I feel like the flavours are touching like bing, bing, bing different taste buds all over my mouth.
Even though I don’t have the chocolate in my mouth anymore.
It looked like you were having an out of body experience.
I kind of was.
I’m thinking of the science behind it and the nitrogen and how he put the nitrogen in.
Ok, let me try it.
Like this is an experience.
It’s not just trying chocolate.
It’s not only…it’s really an experience.
Let’s do it.
You do it!
Yeah.
Ok.
It is hard to get these grins off our faces.
Like I knew it was going to be good chocolate.
We’re in Belgium, we’re at a chocolate festival, it was recommended.
Like I had high expectations.
Honestly, I don’t feel like I need to try any more chocolate in Belgium
because I’m so sure that nothing is going to surpass that experience.
It’s actually funny because we’re at a chocolate festival.
So there’s just all kinds of merchants selling chocolate.
Tons of them.
All the best ones.
And I had no interest in trying any other chocolate after that.
Nope.
We said bye to him and I was like, ’Yeah, time to go.’
Yeah, I’m good.
Like we started at the top and we can leave now.
Do you realize we’re making a video about food?
We’re supposed to go eat other stuff now.
I know. It just might be all downhill.
I kind of forgot.
Ok so we’ve just left the market square and it’s about a ten minute walk.
We’re heading off to get some fries now.
And - full disclosure - we actually went to this place yesterday
because where we’re staying at our Airbnb
is very far from the downtown kind of tourist area
and we just stumbled across this place that was all locals and just…
We loved it.
Absolutely loved it.
And the area where we just were is full of fry places
but none of them looked as legit as this one so we wanted to go back.
They were so nice and there were only locals there.
Apparently they line up around the block so…
That’s what you want to find.
Yeah. So that’s where we’re headed now.
I guess we’re trying to recreate yesterday since it was so good.
It was a success.
It was a success, yes.
Thank you.
Ooh it’s bubbling away back there.
Oh my god.
Ooooh oh my god.
Thank you.
I could eat mayo out of a jar.
In fact, I think I have.
So I fit right in in this country.
Look at this.
That’s just mayo.
Absolutely delicious.
Like a delicious gravy on Sunday night.
It’s almost like a Sunday roast in a dipping sauce.
Yeah, exactly.
When you look outside what do you see?
I don’t know - nothing.
Exactly.
There’s no tourists here.
It’s a local spot.
Yeah.
That was really, really good.
That woman, Valerie, is SO nice.
She is just such a lovely person.
So anyway great, great place to get fries in Bruges.
So good.
Yeah.
And I think it’s waffle time now.
I would agree.
We’ve had sweet,
salty,
and now it’s time for some more sweet.
Back to the sweets.
What is more Belgian than waffles?
I actually think waffles more than fries or chocolate are the number one thing that I think of.
A hundred percent. Me too.
I think most people think of.
Do you want chocolate with whipped cream and strawberries?
Yeah.
You’re like, ‘Yeah, I think it would be best.’
That’s the right thing to do, yes.
It’s the right thing to do.
Look at that.
That looks amazing.
It’s so beautiful looking.
The way they did it in, like, two little towers of whipped cream.
And she put extra icing sugar on.
I think you’d better bite into that.
Oh - we’re sharing this, right?
That, my friends, is the look of somebody who’s just gone to heaven.
Waffles I’ve had before don’t have this crunchiness on the outside.
She said in Belgium there are actually two types of waffles:
the Brussels waffles and then the Liège waffles.
And the Brussels ones are bigger with no sugar on the outside,
which sounds more like at home.
These are the smaller Liège waffles and they’re made with sugar
so, as they cook the waffle,
the sugar actually caramelizes on the outside and it gives this delicious crunch
as you bite into it and then it’s soft inside.
So good.
This is exceeding my expectations.
Yeah.
So we just left the waffle place and we found this really nice guy to help us find this pub
because Google Maps for some reason in Bruges just seems to struggle quite a bit
and it puts us five, ten minutes away from where we actually are.
The map is actually shaking like as if I was shaking the phone but - I don’t know.
So this nice guy walked us all the way through Bruges and brought us to the pub that we’re going to now.
To get a beer!
Which is last on our list of things to do
and apparently this particular place has been in business for over 500 years.
It’s called Cafe Vlissinghe and it opened in 1515.
So that’s where we’re headed now.
All right so the consensus is that Belgian beer equals good
because even she liked her beer and she doesn’t like beer.
Yeah, no I actually drank the whole thing.
It was nice.
Yeah.
Yeah, I didn’t hate it like normal.
Yeah, I really enjoyed mine too.
It was really nice.
Yeah and I think my favourite part was just being in that pub, though, with all of that history.
The fact that it’s been that pub for 500 years?
And we actually found out that the building itself is even older.
It was from 1485 and it became a pub in 1515.
So super cool.
It just has that atmosphere that you cannot manufacture.
No.
Just that coziness after years and years.
I even made the proclamation that this is my favourite pub in all of Bruges.
But it so happens to be the only one. -It’s the only one we’ve been to!
But still. -But I would keep going there.
Yeah, I would go back.
I really - if you like history, even if you don’t like beer.
Or if you like beer obviously they had a lots of beers to choose from.
Yeah and if you don’t like beer they had wine and all kinds of other things.
So hopefully you guys enjoyed today as much as we did.
We ate a lot of food.
I loved all of it.
Me too.
None of the food let us down.
So hopefully you guys enjoyed this day out in Bruges,
eating lots of Belgian food.
And, if you haven’t already, then please subscribe to our channel for lots more travel videos
and we’ll see you in our next one.
Bye!