Gault&Millau Belgium 2020:
the new Chef of the Year and all other Laureates

Nov 4, 2019

The 2020 edition of the Gault&Millau Guide was presented this Monday afternoon in the presence of the members of the press and over 1,000 professionals from the restaurant sector as the seventeenth consecutive edition. The Guide’s anonymous inspectors have reviewed over 1,300 restaurants in Belgium and Luxembourg, including 130 new dining establishments.

Lint, 4 November 2019: In front of an audience of more than 1,000 restaurateurs, reporters and partners, Marc Declerck en Gerald Watelet have just unveiled the seventeenth edition of the Gault&Millau Belux Guide. This year, the Chef of the Year 2020 title goes to Bert Meewis at Restaurant Slagmolen in Oudsbergen. “In picking Bert Meewis as Chef of the Year, we are opting for a cuisine in which expertise, serenity, a sense of purpose and a sharp focus take centre stage. Genuineness behind the cookers and on the plate combine to make up the two cornerstones of this restaurant”, the editorial team explains. “Well executed and refreshed traditional cuisine has been all the rage over the past few years and remains extremely popular with the Belgian public”, CEO Marc Declerck goes on to confirm.

Climbers in the top tier for this year are Boury, Le Coq aux Champs and La Paix each scoring 17.5/20, Bozar restaurant and Vrijmoed each rated at 17/20, and Kamo, ’t Korennaer, Schatteman, Sir Kwinten and Willem Hiele with 16/20 each. Hof van Cleve and Bon-Bon retain their 19.5/20 top score. As the first among equals, Hof van Cleve has been awarded five golden toques this year.

Among the Young Chefs of the Year, the prize winners are Glenn Verhasselt (Sir Kwinten – Lennik) for Flanders, Jean Vrijdaghs & Sébastien Hankard (Le Gastronome - Paliseul) for Wallonia and Grégoire Gillard (Barge – Brussels) for the Brussels Region.

Also singled out for praise in the themed categories are the following laureates:

Hostess of the Year: Anca Petrescu (Alexandre – Brussels)

Italian Chef of the Year: Eros Tomassetti (Diverso – Westerlo)

Asian Restaurant of the Year: Dim Dining (Antwerp)

The most delightful terrace: Le Chalet de la Forêt (Brussels)

The most attractive restaurant design (new award): La Table de Maxime (Paliseul)

Sommelier of the Year: Stéphane Dardenne (L’air du temps – Liernu)

Dessert of the Year: Adriana Zafiris and Frederic Castro (Sōma - Antwerp)

Brasserie of the Year: Les Brigittines (Brussels)

Gastro-Bistro of the Year: Bistro Racine (Braine-le-Château)

Artisan of the Year: Arold Bourgeois (Little Paris – Waterloo)

Vegetable Course of the Year: Benoit Dewitte (Benoit & Bernard Dewitte – Kruisem-Ouwegem)

Newcomer of the Year: August (Antwerp)

Wine List of the Year: Le Pilori (Ecaussinnes)

Beer List of the Year: De Jonkman (Bruges)

'Price & pleasure ratio' of the Year: Mout (Damme), Tandem (Brussels) and Le Pavillon du Vieux Château (Modave)

The 3 Discoveries of the Year: Hoeve De Bies (Voeren), Coquum (Brussels) and Antoine (Eupen).

Launched two years ago, the Cahier POP brings together the best ‘gourmet street & fast food’ places and is fast expanding. It already contains over 300 casual eateries where guests are certain to enjoy a fun and leisurely dining experience. The three POP laureates for 2020 are Golden Gai in Ghent, Fernand Obb Delicatessen in Brussels and Tero in Bierges. Discover this unique collection at https://be.gaultmillau.com/collections/pop.

The gourmet Guide covers no less than 130 new eateries, even though some 190 of them were taken off the list, often because they closed down.

This year again, the Gault&Millau Guide is so much more than just a restaurant guide. As part of the 2020 Guide, the publisher is presenting two sumptuously illustrated booklets: ‘Finest Chocolatiers in Belgium and Luxembourg’ and ‘Great Cocktail Bars in Belgium’. Jigger’s in Ghent was picked as Cocktail Bar of the Year 2020. For further details and the full shortlist of all 35 cocktail bars, please go to www.gaultmillau.be. The best Chocolatiers were announced five weeks ago at the launch event at Chocolate Nation. This selection of outstanding master chocolate makers is waiting to be discovered at www.gaultmillau.be.

The app and the website remain free and additional tools that are finding increasingly more favour among users, albeit without this success translating in a rising number of guides sold. CEO Marc Declerck takes pride in pointing out that, at 30,000 pre-ordered copies, Gault&Millau remains the Belgian-Luxembourg leader in the sector by a country mile. He is quick to add that, in addition, Gault&Millau is continuing to innovate through a variety of new projects. For one thing, the organisation is further developing its consultancy activities, with various projects in the catering (industrial kitchens, event catering and festivals), gastronomy and product development sectors.

The 2020 Gault&Millau Belux Guide will be in bookshops from the middle of this week and still retails at 29 euros. It is also available to be ordered from the shop.gaultmillau.be website. At the www.gaultmillau.be website which continues to carry the free app, users can look up restaurants based on various criteria.


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