©Laurent Gerbaud - Box Mondrian 65 pieces, containing the entire collection
With Easter approaching, you are certainly looking for a tasteful and quality chocolate maker to please your loved ones, but also yourself. If I can only recommend one, it is the addictive Laurent Gerbaud, in Brussels. Tested and approved for many years!
SUMMARY
The atypical career path of Laurent Gerbaud
The chocolates and other products offered
The tea room
The Saturday chocolate workshops
Practical information
1. The atypical career path of Laurent Gerbaud
©DYOD - Laurent Gerbaud
The founder of the chocolate factory, Laurent Gerbaud, has a rather special background.
Indeed, he comes from a family of pastry chefs and bakers and is himself a true cooking enthusiast (and also of China, we will come back to this later). Afterwards, he obtained a degree in Medieval History, but what his parents did not know was that he was also training to become a baker, a compulsory step at the time to become a chocolate maker. Then, he did an internship where he learned about chocolate and several small jobs to pay for a backpacking trip through several Asian countries.
Finally, he arrived in Shanghai, where he wanted to do a market study on Belgian chocolate. But this did not work out and he opened a small clandestine workshop of cakes and mousses that he sold to expatriates. He speaks fluent Mandarin. His Asian experience allowed him to discover the local culinary tastes, very different from sugar, which made his own tastes evolve.
Finally, he returned to Belgium and gradually opened his store on Rue Ravenstein, which remains today the location of his main store, the tea room and the chocolate workshops. He offers an intense and deep chocolate, without added sugar, butter, alcohol, preservatives, additives or artificial flavors, fused with the flavors he encountered during his travels and, among others, with fruits and spices.
2. The chocolates and other products offered
"Gerbaud chocolate, the chocolate that makes you beautiful!"
When you are in the main store on Rue Ravenstein, the workshop is visible just behind the counter. If I had to describe Gerbaud's chocolates, I would say that they are fine, of high quality, very powerful in taste and perfectly balanced. And the range of products is very varied:
Crunchy pralines: Evoia pistachios, sesame, buckwheat, Piedmont hazelnuts, pecans, peanuts,...
Melting ganaches: taggiasche olives, pepper, tea,...
Roasted and salted dried fruits mendiants: Evoia pistachios, Piedmont hazelnuts, almond, Persian red berries, cranberries, rhubarb,...
Chocolate covered fruits: Cape pear, Barrydale apricot, Guilin ginger, Izmir fig, lemon, orange, grapefruit,...
Fruit pastes: strawberry-yuzu, tropical, citrus, pear-cardamom,...
Spreads: Piedmont hazelnuts, salted butter caramel,...
Chocolate bars: Guérande flower of salt, speculoos, Calabrian bergamot, Japanese yuzu, Alnif cumin, sweet peppers,...
The price is reasonable considering the high quality and supreme taste of the products offered. It is more interesting to buy in bags than in boxes, but the boxes are nice in case of gifts to make!
3. The tea room
The tea room is located in the main store, Rue Ravenstein. The atmosphere is modern and warm, in warm tones. The service is very kind. Laurent Gerbaud, often present, is himself very accessible and pleasant, with always a little note of humor!
You can sit inside the store, as well as outside, weather permitting (if Belgium allows it)! For the cold ones, plaids are at disposal. Note that here, the service is done at the counter, so a little advice: reserve a table first before having to make some difficult choices... or not!
For me, every time I come, summer or winter, I take the hot chocolate with its strong and spicy aromas, which can be topped with cream or amaretto or speculoos, among others, a delight. The tea room also offers quality coffees and a nice selection of green and black teas and infusions. My only small drawback is the dishes that I find a little dated, but that's just my opinion!
The little bonus is that a praline of your choice is offered with the drinks, but you can of course take others to taste several (or all) of Laurent Gerbaud's sublime proposals.
My five favorites:
The Gare aux Noisettes (from Piedmont): I think it's a great idea to reinvent the Ferrero Rocher in a high quality version. It is a chocolate ball with a praline heart, crispy and liquid, and a whole hazelnut.
Pistachio and sesame: for their powerful taste.
Buckwheat and black taggiasche olives: for their originality (the olive chocolate still managed to make me love olives, that's to say, the association and the sweet-salty balance between olive and chocolate are perfect, and it is thanks to this same olive chocolate that Laurent Gerbaud won a gold medal in 2017 at the International Chocolate Awards (London)).
Finally, the tea room also offers some pastries (like fondants, cookies, for example) and ice creams, but that I never tested, filling each time my stomach of all these chocolates...
4. The Saturday chocolate workshops
Every Saturday, from 11:30 am to 1 pm, in the workshop of the main store located in Rue Ravenstein, workshops are held with Laurent Gerbaud in person, highly recommended! I had the chance to do one and he knows how to transmit his devouring passion for chocolate, with a lot of humor and good mood.
These are chocolate initiation workshops, in two parts: you educate your palate by tasting twelve chocolates and you make your own mendiants with which you leave.
You can do these workshops alone, as a couple, as a family, with friends, with colleagues, in short, in all circumstances!
Bonus: when you participate in a workshop, you get a 10% discount on your purchases in the store that day.
Workshops are by reservation only, and to reserve, go here!
5. Practical information
There are three Laurent Gerbaud stores in Brussels:
The main store, the tea room and the workshop place, near the Central Station and the Mont des Arts: Rue Ravenstein 2D, 1000 Brussels.
The store near the Grand Place: Rue de l'Etuve 19, 1000 Brussels.
The store in Uccle: Chaussée de Waterloo 1253, 1180 Uccle.
It is also possible to order on the online store and have it delivered at home in Belgium, France and Luxembourg.
Delivery is also possible in the region of Brussels and its periphery by ordering on the very serious and brilliant site Home Gourmet. Notice to the gourmands!
To finish convincing you of Laurent Gerbaud's humor... and magic powers, I leave you with this. So, what are you waiting for to go there? :-)
By the way, sorry about the paper below, it is only in French... But, in two words, it is a caricature of the advertisements for the marabouts that we can receive at home, version chocolate maker ;-)
=> I hope this article was able to help you in your quest for the perfect chocolate maker in Brussels and, if you ever have any questions or comments, don't hesitate, I'll gladly get back to you!
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