Le Pigeon Noir

Treat your grandma and cater to her appetite? Le Pigeon Noir kills two birds with one stone at this Uccle bistro that hasn’t budged a feather for at least… decades! Retro ad posters, pigeons galore, wooden booths, red faux leather high chairs, and on the plates, you can expect classic, unfussy cuisine – a recipe that Benoît De Mol borrowed from his dad, Henri. Our lunch was a meaty grand slam: barely poached veal brains, served straight-up with tartare sauce and a few corn salad leaves for good form; the house’s famous pigeon salmis, slow-cooked in red wine and paired with a lemony sage jus, backed up by pigeon liver on toast and some insignificant wilted Swiss chard; and just before paying the bill, a small box of sweets to delight kids (what few there were) and oldies alike, with Delacre wafers, cuberdon candies and sour gummy bears… Maybe next time we’ll have room for the homemade sabayon or the café Liègeois ice cream dessert! // Rosa Poulsard

FEELING THIRSTY? The house aperitif, made with white wine and Labiau bitters from the Distillerie du Centenaire in Wiers, and old-fashioned wines, of course, like Fleurie from the Clos de la Madone (€7 a glass, €39 a bottle) or Gewurztraminer from Domaine Trimbach (€52 a bottle)…

PRICE: À la carte €50-120, cheese €12.