L'Air du Temps - Liernu, Belgium

Sunday lunch @ L'Air du Temps by chef Sang-Hoon Degeimbre

We had lunch this Sunday 28 April at two Michelin starred L'Air du Temps. The restaurant has moved to a farm in Liernu this past January, surrounded by fields and with gardens for growing veggies and rare herbs. There are 2 points worth noting about the chef. First, he never received a formal culinary school training; he actually began his career as a sommelier. Second, he is Korean-born, grew up in Belgium and this perhaps explains the Asian influence his cuisine.

The main restaurant building:

Inside the restaurant:

The window view from our table

Table layout

Bienvenue

There was already a super thin flatbread sitting on a piece of rock on our table. Soon after we were seated, some "water" was served, a signature welcome drink of L'Air du Temps.


Le Pain - Bread without yeast, with sesame and onion

L'Eau - Eau parfumée à la tanaisie (Tansy perfumed water) - this was an interesting discovery, although not impressive enough for us to order the water menu called "Nos créations sans alcool".

We selected the surprise April 2013 Genèses menu with 5 courses with matching wines (Nos vins d'envie). As always, She requested a pescetarian menu and the staff was totally fine with this request.

Let's begin our meal, which consisted of 4 snacks, 2 bouchées, 4 savory courses, 1 dessert and mignardises. 

Snacking

Cerfeuil tubéreux, Ponzu, Ail Noir

Céléri - Pamplemousse - Salers fumé

Choux rave - Radicchio - Anchois

Chicon - Jambon - Gruyère

Bouchées

Choux fleur - Buratta - Cacahuètes

Oeuf coque - Petit gris (de Namur) - Curcuma

While we were enjoying the second bouchée, oil, butter and salt were brought to our table, followed by bread.

Sicilian olive oil
Fleur de sel d'Angleterre
Beurre fermier - plain and with Yuzu

Bread - some might find the bottom crust too hard and slightly burnt, but we enjoyed it.

Dégustation

Now's the beginning of our 5 courses lunch.

Course 1

Tartare aux couteaux - Veau - Couteau - Bergamote
Accompanied by: Domaine de la Grand Cour Fleurie - Beaujolais - 2010

Course 1 - non-meat


A waiter brought a tree stump board  covered with a glass lid to our table. As he lifted the lid and the steam dissipated, we saw some potatoes resting on some Sphagnum moss.

A few minutes later the potatoes were served:

Pommes de terre cuites à la vapeur
Croustillant faits à base des pelures de pommes de terre
Jus vert à base de Lierre terrestre (ground ivy) et égopode (ground elder)
Fleurs: Tussilage
Feuilles: Lierre terrestre

Course 2

Crème cuite de crevettes grises - Couteaux - Concombre
Accompanied by: O.V.N.I. Objet Viticole Non Identifié J. Mourat - Loire valley - 2012

This dish was barely lukewarm. Perhaps that was the intention, but we would have preferred a warmer broth.

Course 3

Cabillaud - Miso - Crème aigre - Gomasio
Accompanied by: Santorini Argyros - Assyrtiko 2012

Course 4

Agneau de Bellac (Limousin) - Tomates - Bleu - Gingembre
Accompanied by: Chateau Musar Jeune - Bekaa valley  - 2010

What a memorable lamb dish! Plus the beautiful Lebanese red matched the lamb perfectly!

Course 4 - seafood version

Turbot - Coques - Jus vert de shiso et ricotta

Condiment: poivrons rouge, pomme, kimchi et zeste d'orange

Poudre de coraille d'homard

Achillée millefeuille

Desserts

Course 5

MMMMh! Crème catalane - Tonka - Topinambour
Accompanied by: The Madeira Collection 2 - Reserve- dry

Notice the Korean flag! This dessert was good yet, compared to what we had been eating so far,  seemed to be somewhat ordinary. I was hoping to see some more creativity here.

Course 5 - alternative dessert

Carrot-themed dessert

Carottes confites - Mousse au chocolat blanc - Orange - Chips de pommes de terre - Sucre à la coriandre.

Again, no wow factor in this dessert either. For a dessert, it was not sweet enough, the potato chips were to blame. As to the sugar, cardamom would have been a better match than coriander.

What are we to make of these 2 desserts ? While they were slightly underwhelming, we thought that perhaps that was intentional, like in Japanese and Korean restaurants, where the dessert is supposed to be a light sweet ending to the meal as opposed to the heavy desserts in French cuisine.

Mignardises

Sorbet à l'huile d'olive avec un papier de sucre autour (the lollipop)
Caramel pistache-orange (in the foil)
Un Paris-Brest revisité
Guimauve au chocolat (Chocolate marshmallow)
Biscuit (cigare) au chocolat

Verbena infusion served in an East Asian cast iron teapot.

Unlike other Michelin starred restaurants that offer 1-2 extra mignardises along with tea/coffee,  here all we got was some sugars and sweetener served in what resembled a dim sum tray. Perhaps the rock sugar counted as a sweet ? :)

As we were about to leave, a waiter accompanied us to have a look at the kitchen. It was 16:30 by then and the crew was busy plating a couple of desserts and cleaning had begun. Chef Sang-Hoon saw us and walked over to shake our hands and we chatted for a little while.

While one could hope for some improvements on the dessert side, overall this was such a lovely meal by an incredibly talented chef, which was totally worth the hour long car ride from Brussels. This meal was a beautiful exploration of new ingredients, textures and flavors.

L'Air du Temps

Liernu, Belgium
www.airdutemps.be

Rouge Piment Vietnamese restaurant - Brussels

Rouge Piment serves vietnamese and thai cuisine. Located close to the Brussels Bourse, an area with a number of Vietnamese and Thai restaurants, Rouge Piment has been open for less than a year. We visited the restaurant using a discounted coupon good for a 4 course menu.

The interior was fairly new looking and quite nice actually.

Our 4 course menu began with a pineapple aperitif

Soups

Potage aux raviolis Wantan

Potage de scampis à la citronnelle

Starters

Batonnets de canne à sucre aux langoustines

 
Calamars grillés piquants

Mains

Scampis sautés aux légumes

Canard au basilic et piments

Dessert

Beignets d'ananas

Beignets de banane

From our previous experiences with discounted coupons, we were expecting below par food quality and service and smaller portions. Rouge Piment was such a pleasant surprise. The four course menu we had was actually the same offered in their printed menu, and we were offered 3 options for each course. From the aperitif to the dessert, everything was beautifully presented. One improvement we'd suggest, however, would be to cut down on their use of fish sauce, which left a strong glutamate aftertaste.

This restaurant was a nice discovery and we'll happily be back.

Rouge Piment
Restaurant vietnamien - thai
Rue Auguste Orts 6, Bruxelles 1000
http://rouge-piment.weebly.com/index.html

Kokuban Japanese - Brussels

Kokuban is a Japanese restaurant located at the corner of Avenue Louise and Rue Vilain XIII. This area has a concentration of Japanese businesses, with Nagomi supermarket and Izakaya close by on Chaussée de Vleurgat.

Kokuban means black slate. They had a black wall used as a slate, with drawings of Japan's four main islands and ramen/broth composition.

Otsumami: marinated seaweed salad and Tako Gari (octopus and ginger salad)

Onigiri with cod roe

Karaage ramen with fried chicken nuggets

Soba with tofu

Almond pudding

Mochi ice cream - sakura and green tea flavors

Otsumami serving sizes are small by default and one needs 2-3 for a real starter course, which in the end makes the starter course more expensive than the main dish. The ramen and soba, however, were excellent. We will be returning to Kokuban fairly soon!

Kokuban restaurant japonais
http://www.kokuban.be

Chile à la Carta - Le Chalet d'Odin Thon Hotel - Brussels

Thon Hotel Bristol Stephanie organized a Chilean gastronomy event in early March. "Chile à la Carta" was hosted in the hotel's Le Chalet d'Odin restaurant. In the past couple of years they also had Brazilian and Mexican themed weeks. We were excited about discovering Chilean cuisine and made a reservation for dinner. The poster for the event was mouth watering, as captured from the Thon web site:

As we walked into the rather darkish restaurant, we saw some traditional Chilean costumes, some posters and in a corner, a replica of a Moai from Easter Island.

Main courses

Picante spicy shrimp with walnut cream, chili and cheese
Served with rice/ginger and basil-cilantro green coulis, oven roasted artichokes

Beef stewed in tomato sauce with dry plums in red wine
Accompanied with mushrooms and quinoa, beans with butter

Swordfish fillet sealed with brown butter and covered with coriander and chives

Served with mashed potatoes and Ariqueño tapenade, roasted cherry tomatoes and Rocoto chili foam

Pomairino Corn Pie

Soft corn paste flavored with fresh basil, covering stewed beef with cumin and smoked paprika, roast chicken, raison, olives and quail egg

Desserts

Fig gratin, citrus syrup and Enguindao cherry liqueur
Late Harvest meringue mousse, nougatine and caramelized almonds

Copa Manjares

Cheese cream and "Manjar Blanco" covered with Manjar mousse with a touch of pisco and mandarines, chocolate

Dessert sampler

The  mains took an incredibly long time to get served. In fact, the corn pie had to be baked, which meant that some of us received cold dishes that had been lying on a counter top for a while. For the prices charged, it was a shame that the dishes were plain average and did not seem to have any rare ingredients that had to be brought from Chile. We doubt that they had flown in a Chilean chef; it seemed that the regular cook was improvising with some new recipes. Actually, going to a fine dining starred restaurant would have cost slightly more than 3 courses at the Chalet d'Odin. Even worse, while we were having dessert, the waiters began re-arranging the dining room to prepare for the next day's breakfast.

We will not return to Le Chalet d'Odin, the type of place that gives hotel restaurants a bad name...

Le Chalet d'Odin

Thon Hotel Bristol Stephanie

Avenue Louise, Brussels