The Lover and I did a day-trip to Brussels over the weekend. Yes. A day trip. We've heard stuff about Brussels, stuff that didn't really entail us spending more than 14hours over there. So, a day trip it was then. To be very honest, Brussels was great! The people were incredibly friendly, though there weren't that many of them out and about, the food was great, and it snowed. So triple yay!
Because we didn't really pre-plan our trip, we basically wandered around the city, zooming into places that our tattered piece of map that we got from the train station recommended. And although the pictures aren't really in chronological order, I thought i'd start with moules et frites. Quintessential Belgian food, we had ours done with white beer, and it came in a humongous pot. We ate that for a record breaking 2.5hours. The bar/restaurant was perfect- with people shuffling around, boistorous music, talk and laughter and yet strangely, non-invasive. Well the mussels were fantastic and the beer was equally good. I had a hoegaarden rosee (raspberry), and that was much much better than hoegaarden. I'm not a fan of white beer, or beers for that matter, unlike my newly-inspired beer-loving partner.
In between locating cathedrals and the shopping streets (which we never got to, pity), we chanced upon the red/green tent. Our almost ziltch knowledge of french ordered us raw oysters instead of raw mussels. But really, we weren't complaining. The mussels were HUGE! they were incredibly creamy and just (ok, i really can't find another word here), orgasmic. We slurped down 3 each before talking to each other. Screw conversations and small-talk in between each. We saw, we scooped it all up, and we finished them all.
We stopped for some soupe poisson (fish soup) after trying to locate the shopping street to no avail, and yup- best decision all day. With all the snow and my very soaked boots, the piping hot soup was my comfort food. and seriously, i don't think you can ever have too much seafood in a day. ever.
One of the recommended places on our tattered map was this chocolate place - but obviously, that was way out of my meagre budget of the day, so it was to remain a feast for the eyes only. damn.
So there, our trip to Brussels ended with us at the cool bar/restaurant, taking 2.5hours to finish our humongous bowl of mussels. I do think the waitress thought we were wierd. After all, I don't think 1 person takes that long to finish a bowl, let alone 2 people. And for the uninitiated, and those who read the lover's blog where there's a fugly picture of me- i really needed to put this picture up and exclaim that we all have bad photo days. Well, me, I have bad photo hours.
Hats and me really don't go together. I must stop trying.
