A cut-out-and-keep Belgian Menu

Bored of waiting for service in your restaurant? Afraid of an interminable wait between getting your menu and ordering? Visiting Belgium for the first time? Don’t speak the language?

Never fear! The Kim Bah Lee cut-out-and-keep pocket-sized menu is here! Never be lost in a restaurant again!

Based on extensive research, the trusty dining companion can be used in ANY Belgian restaurant! Just point to what you feel like eating, be it prawns OR beef, and your waiter will bring you the freshest prawns or beef available!

It’s in French and English, good for dining in any Brussels-based establishment! And what’s more, it’s FREE! You’ll never need to look at another menu again*!

Belgian Menu*not for use in bars that *also* serve food. In such cases, please memorise “spaghetti bolognaise” or “croque monsieur”

03/23/2009 | Belgium | 1 Comment

Kokob: Ethiopian

Appetising?

Kokob, Ethiopian restaurant downtown. On the basis of rave reviews, I booked a table for four on a Saturday night without hassle.

Free rum-based aperitif. There wasn’t much rum in it, but it was appreciated.

It’s a concept restaurant. The concept is that you eat with your hands, off a shared, edible plate. Which makes for less washing up. And is, thus, green. Eat at Kokob and save the Ethiopian Panda!

There is also an awesome Dyson hand-drier that alone is worth a trip to the bathroom.

The menu was complex, and interpreting it required cross-referencing the transliterated Amharic with the index, and a degree. Without any further education between the four us, we went for the McEthiopia Bumper Meal Deal: three meats, three veg and half a bottle of wine and water per person, for 30 euros a head.

The chef chose the food, which was satisfactory, if lacking in texture. The tables next door, presumably clever enough to interpret the menu, had big lumps of flesh in gravy and the occasional hard-boiled egg. We had large dollops of minced meat, spicy, and not so easy to eat with bits of flat bread.

Apparently it was lamb and beef. Which was fine, but it could have been anything. The bread-cutlery was filling and there was more of it when we asked.

The coffee came with great ceremony, was home-brewed, ground and smoked. It was served in tiny cups from broken pot with a lump of tin-foil in place of a lid. It was weak and pissy. Which is fine, if you’re an American. Or, presumably, Ethiopian.

The overwhelming feeling was one of distinct apathy. The service was good, the food was ok, the prices very reasonable. Can’t not recommend it, but won’t be rushing back. Try it. Or don’t. You be the judge.

03/18/2009 | Belgium | No Comments

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