A NEW ZING IN THE BRUSSELS ZEITGEIST

A Gray cloud used to hang over Brussels. You could see it in the fall as rain and wind blew in from the North Sea, but it was there on those rare sunny days as well.

That was what I thought when I spent a weekend in the city about a decade ago, and afterward the impression persisted. Brussels was the butt of jokes. Too boring, bourgeois and buttoned-up for bons vivants, it was perennially bypassed on the grand tour. It was a place where people drank beer instead of wine and ate horsemeat pot au feu. It was an hour and a half by train and light years away from Paris.

“Small country, small people,” said Leopold II, the king of Belgium from 1865 to 1909.

Old Leopold, who was wrong about many things, would stroke his beard in consternation to see today’s Brussels. It was never that dull to begin with. It’s still the capital of a small country tucked between France and the Netherlands, but it’s also the headquarters of the European Union, the collection of 15 European countries that together boast the second-strongest economy in the world. The cloud over Brussels is lifting to reveal a city changed by corporate and political players drawn to the burgeoning EU. These well-heeled, polyglot, cosmopolitan people, who may wish they’d been assigned to posts in London or Paris, are putting some zing in the city’s zeitgeist, whether they know it or not.

When I went back in early September to spend two weeks with my sister and brother-in-law, I could hear evidence of the transformation on the streets where almost everyone, it seems, speaks several languages. Brussels has started to spruce up its manifold shaggy parks and pay long-needed attention to its architectural masterpieces, which go well beyond such famous tourist attractions as the Grand Place. In trendy neighborhoods such as Uccle and Ixelles, distinguished old townhouses and apartment buildings with Art Nouveau flourishes are being renovated to make room for the EU crowd. And on virtually every corner, intimate new restaurants, cafes and bistros are opening with menus that make the celebrated mussels and fries seem about as inventive as meatloaf. Candles flicker, people linger and windows fog as the rooms heat up with high spirits and conversation.

Those who think of Brussels as a blank-faced “Euroghetto” with a handful of washed-up charms should get beyond the Grand Place. They should take the tram down wide, elegant, sycamore-lined Avenue Louise, visit the perfect Art Nouveau ensemble that was the home and studio of Victor Horta, the architect and designer who dotted Brussels with masterworks, and see Leopold II’s grand triumphal arch in the Parc du Cinquantenaire, financed by blood money from the Belgian Congo. They should stand back and look again at Brussels, as I did.

It would, of course, be folly to ignore the city’s beloved old charms. All roads lead to the Grand Place, a venerable Flemish Renaissance central square and one of Europe’s great architectural set pieces, miraculously preserved despite the ravages of time and war. To stand on its cobblestones, surrounded by 16th and 17th century guildhouses, all decorated in a whirligig of gilt and stone, is to take a short course in European history and have your heart lifted.

In the Maison du Roi, a museum on the northeast side of the Grand Place, I saw a huge, lush 17th century tapestry based on a design by Peter Paul Rubens, made at a time when Brussels dominated the European textile industry; a painting of a village procession attributed to Peter Brueghel the Elder that reminded me, in its vividness, of the comic books so adored by the Bruxellois; and a collection of costumes that have garbed Manneken Pis, the city’s iconic 17th century bronze statue a few blocks away of a little boy urinating gleefully.

He expresses the earthy sense of humor of the Bruxellois, who, over the years, have dressed him as Elvis, a French courtier, a Japanese daimyo and a Boy Scout. Less well known is his sister statue, erected, out of political correctness, I guess, in 1985. She is pigtailed Janneken Pis, who squats in response to the call of nature in a cul de sac several blocks northeast of the Grand Place.

Across from the Maison du Roi is the square’s cynosure, the mostly neo-gothic Hotel de Ville, originally constructed in the 15th century but renovated throughout the years and further embellished in the 19th. A host of stone gargoyles, saints, burghers and maidens decorate the facade. Dragon-slaying St. Michael occupies the pinnacle of the soaring tower, which alone survived French bombardment in 1695. Inside, tourists can see portraits of various French, Dutch, Spanish and Austrian rulers of Brussels (Belgium didn’t become an independent nation, with its own monarchy, until 1830), and the tapestry-lined Council Hall, where the burgomaster, or mayor, of Brussels still presides over meetings. Touristy shops, currency exchange booths, art galleries and sidewalk cafes, most of negligible interest, surround the Grand Place. Consider: Paid admission to the Belgian Brewers Museum offers access to displays about contemporary brewing and a beer, donated by members of the Belgian Brewers association.

Brussels and beer are like Naples and pizza. At home I seldom touch the stuff and wasn’t inclined to change my ways in Brussels, as marvelous French wines are on offer at restaurants and cafes. Still, I came to appreciate Leffe blonde, a sophisticated blend of malted barley and wheat, and sparkling cherry-flavored Krieks, based on a recipe using heirloom hops. Impressively, each beer is served in its own kind of glass, most of which seem to be on display at the Beer Temple, one of a handful of compelling shops near the Grand Place.

Other noteworthy shops include Monsel Parapluies, a small, elegant umbrella emporium in the glass-roofed Galeries Royales de St. Hubert, Europe’s first shopping arcade, built in 1847. Between the Grand Place and the Bourse, a neoclassical temple that originally served as the city’s stock exchange, I found Dandoy Biscuiterie, which smells of spice and specializes in the delicious little cookies that routinely come when you order a cup of tea at a cafe. And just off the Grand Place on Rue de la Colline is a boutique dedicated to the comic strip hero Tintin, an intrepid young reporter with a cowlick who says things like “Great snakes!”

You can’t claim to have exhausted the Grand Place area, however, without a visit to the nearby Rue de Bouchers, lined by seafood restaurants and cafes that proudly show their wares on tables heaped with the catch of the day from the cold North Sea--sole, turbot, callibaud, oysters and mussels. Advised by friends of my sister and brother-in-law, I chose Chez Leon, where I ordered a prix fixe lunch, beginning with a Leffe blonde and a tomato stuffed with tiny, intense tasting shrimp. Then it was on to the Brussels classic, fries and mussels.

Belgium and France both claim to have invented French fries (though the tuber came to Europe from the Americas around 1600), and, I must say, I’ve had better fries (dipped in mayonnaise, not ketchup) in Amsterdam. But rarely have I tasted shellfish as good as Chez Leon’s mussels, steamed in cream with leeks, celery and parsley. The Bruxellois use an empty shell as tongs to extract the meat and scoop up the sumptuous soup that remains at the bottom of the bowl after they’ve polished off the mussels.

North and West of the grand place, tourist sights peter out. Among the few worth seeing are the distinguished belle epoque Hotel Metropole on the Place de Brouckere; the grandiose Theatre Royal de la Monnaie, where riots started that led to the liberation of Belgium from Holland in 1830, and Place des Martyrs, a neoclassical beauty that has been under renovation since my last visit to the city, at least.

The Bruxellois have been slow to preserve their architectural heritage. Some works by Horta were demolished, though the remains of the 1899 Maison du Peuple were salvaged for re-creation of the building in Antwerp.

A textile warehouse designed by Horta in 1903 has been gorgeously restored, however. On the Rue des Sables, about a 10-minute walk northeast of the Grand Place, it now serves as the Belgian Center for Comic Strip Art, dedicated to the love affair between the Bruxellois and their cartoons. Its exhibits explain how comic books are made and explore the careers of such famous artists as Peyo, creator of “Johan and Peewit,”a marvelous Medieval epic told comic book style. Georges Remi, who signed his Tintin strips Herge, gets special attention, and a statue of Tintin with his dog Snowy is in the museum’s glorious glass-roofed atrium.

South of the Grand Place, there’s more to see. During my peregrinations one day, I wandered in to the Galerie Bortier, another 19th century shopping arcade that runs between Rues St. Jean and de la Madeleine and is dedicated to books. In a gallery tucked between bookshops, I took in a photographic exhibition on terrorism that included unforgettable pictures of the crumbling World Trade Center towers, and then scavenged sales bins for used volumes of Tintin in French.

From there it takes about 10 minutes, on foot, to reach the Marolles, an old workers quarter that includes the step-gabled house of Peter Brueghel the Elder. Reincarnated as Brussels’ hippest neighborhood, it’s reminiscent of the East Village in New York. One night in the Marolles, I attended an avant-garde dance theater performance at the deconsecrated 17th century Church of the Brigittines, and on a breezy Sunday morning I wandered up and down the Rues Haute and Blaes, lined with funky cafes, art galleries and antique shops selling everything from African masks to Louis XVI chandeliers.

The neighborhood’s heart is the Place du Jeu de Balle, the scene of a popular Sunday morning flea market. There I bought a vintage nightshirt for $15 and had a quiche and salad brunch at Indigo, where the menus are printed by hand on paperback copies of Agatha Christie mysteries, featuring the prissy Belgian detective Hercule Poirot.

A public elevator at the edge of the Marolles takes pedestrians up to the Place Poelaert, dominated by the huge neoclassical Palais de Justice, built between 1866 and 1883. Near its threshold is a sculptural memorial to Belgian infantrymen who died in World War I and II and a promenade overlooking the spires and gables of Brussels. Standing there, you get a sense of how topography divides the city into two towns, the lower, emanating out from the Grand Place, and the upper to the east, climbing to the neighborhood surrounding the Grand Place du Sablon, Parc de Bruxelles and Jardin d’Egmont, Palais Royal and Musees Royaux des Beaux-Arts.

I’d visited the Beaux-Arts, with its Brueghels and Rene Magrittes, on my last trip to Brussels. So this time, I sampled some of the other smaller museums in the upper town, such as the Musical Instrument Museum in a handsomely restored Art Nouveau department store, with stunning city views from its top-floor cafe. When you buy an admission ticket, you get a headset that plays recordings of the instruments you pass while touring the exhibits: Indian sitars, Scottish bagpipes, 16th century virginals, and the saxophone, invented by Belgian Adolphe Sax.

Nearby is the Musee de la Dynastie, devoted to Belgium’s royal family, established in 1830 when the fledgling nation invited Leopold, Duke of Saxe-Coburg, to become its first king. There have been just five Belgian monarchs since then, a mixed lot including Leopold II, who held the Belgian Congo and its enslaved people as his personal fiefdom before ceding it in 1908, as Adam Hochschild documents in his compelling book “King Leopold’s Ghost.” Leopold II’s cane is on display, together with a segment of rope used by Albert I during the climbing accident that took his life in 1934 and toy soldiers that belonged to widely beloved Badouin I, who ruled the country from 1951 to 1993.

The museum district is the most chic part of Brussels, centered around the lovely diminutive Place du Petit Sablon, a formal garden with a cascading fountain surrounded by 48 bronze statues representing the city’s Medieval guilds and done by Art Nouveau artist Paul Hankar. Its northwest edge opens onto the Place du Grand Sablon, lined with fine art and antiques dealers, and confectioneries such as Wittamer and Pierre Marcolini, considered by connoisseurs to be Brussels’ best chocolatier.

I lunched on the terrace at Wittamer, taking time over my delicate little chicken salad sandwiches and watching the Bruxellois walk their dogs. They all seem to have them, and Jack Russells and yellow Labs seem to be favored.

And I mean favored. One night my sister, brother-in-law and I ate at the vaunted and very formal La Truffe Noire. Dinner for two there, with wine, can easily cost $500, and as soon as you sit down, the maitre d’ lets you sniff from a glass canister of black truffles, redolent of the dark forests in France and Italy where they are found. So we noted with some amazement that a lady at a table nearby had a dog. As she left, my sister asked her if the pooch ate truffles. “Oh, yes,” the woman said. “He likes them very much.”

Quartier Leopold, a 15-minute tram ride east of the Grand Place, is the center of operations for 31,500 employees of the sprawling EU and some 10,000 lobbyists. The Bruxellois disparagingly call it a “Euroghetto,” partly because so many people had to move to the suburbs when the neighborhood’s 19th century apartment buildings and townhouses were leveled to make room for undistinguished modern EU office blocks.

The huge glass and granite European Parliament building fits the Euroghetto label somewhat. Still, it wraps partway around Parc Leopold, a vestige of belle epoque Brussels currently under renovation, and overlooks the eccentric little Musee Wiertz. Antoine Wiertz, a 19th century Belgian artist, painted awful monumental canvases based on history and mythology. When one of them was indifferently received at the Paris Salon of 1839, he fought back by writing a vitriolic pamphlet titled “Brussels Capital, Paris Province.”

The Parliament building doesn’t suggest that Brussels is the capital of anything. But the tour is a fascinating lesson about government-in-the-making and a reminder of the potential strength of the nascent EU. Visitors are given headsets when they arrive, yielding audio interpretation in all 11 languages of the EU. My group, composed mostly of young, well-mannered Europeans, saw the horseshoe-shaped debating chamber, where Parliament members are seated by political party, not home country, and cannot filibuster because their microphones are simply turned off if they speak too long.

Since 1958, when Brussels became the headquarters of the European Economic Community, a precusor of the EU, some 80,000 pages of regulations aimed chiefly at harmonizing the differences between constituent states have streamed out of offices in the Quartier Leopold. In “Travels as a Brussels Scout,” the English humorist Nick Middleton warns that the union could fall victim to its own bloated bureaucracy. “And the only thing left would be billions of pieces of paper with stupid rules written on them,” he quips. At the nearby European Info Point on Rue de la Loi, I collected a wad of these regulations brochures on customs, women and job-seeking, though I don’t know what I’ll ever do with them.

The Parc Cinquantenaire spreads eastward from the Quartier Leopold, built chiefly by Leopold II to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the Belgian nation. Three grand triumphal arches overlook its central lawns and tree-lined walkways, with museums on either side. I visited the Musees Royaux d’Art et d’Histoire, a capacious respository of the decorative arts, anthropology and archeology under a prepossessing dome. I had the museum’s smashing collection of tapestry, Gothic retables and Art Nouveau furniture virtually to myself, apparently because few tourists make it to the Parc Leopold.

Fewer still have the time or inclination to explore Ixelles, one of the 19 communes that make up the city. I did in an easygoing way, without agendas, because Ixelles is where my family lives, about a 30-minute tram ride south of the Grand Place.

There I discovered the lakes that lead to the 13th century Abbaye de la Cambre and secretive little Parc Tenbosch, where people play boules (like lawn bowling) after work. I could easily walk from my sister and brother-in-law’s to the circa 1900 home and studio of Victor Horta, which is open for tours, and the exquisite David and Alice van Buuren Musuem, where a financier and his wife decorated their rather plain brick house in the best styles of the early 20th century.

On almost every block in Ixelles, there’s a patisserie and a proud traiteur, such as Maison Felix on Rue Washington, selling specialty foods to cook at home and prepared delicacies such as pate. On Wednesdays, market stalls fill the pleasant Place du Chatelain, some dedicated solely to endive, mushrooms or chocolates.

Brand-name chocolates abound in Brussels, of course. But when you taste the creations of an independent chocolatier such as Laurent Gerbaud, who has a booth at the Place du Chatelain market, you understand why some people need chocolate like narcotics. Gerbaud told me he uses neither sugar or butter in his confections, just cream and cacao.

Some of Brussels’ best new restaurants have turned up in Ixelles--Cafe Camille, with pictures of cowboys on the walls; Quincaillerie, in an Art Deco hardware store; and, above all, En Face de Parachute, which takes its name from an upscale clothing store across the street.

By the time we dined there, I’d already eaten well around Brussels, but En Face de Parachute, in a small candlelit room that used to be a pharmacy, provided my favorite meal. I started with a salad of spinach and foie gras, which was followed by the most remarkable seafood pot au feu, with shrimp, lobster and at least three different kinds of fish, so fresh they may as well still have been swimming in the North Sea. I concluded with three kinds of sorbet for dessert.

It was raining by the time we left, but if there was a gray cloud in the sky I couldn’t see it.

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GUIDEBOOK

Rediscovering Brussels

Telephone numbers and prices: The country code for Belgium is 32. The city code for Brussels is 02. All prices are approximate and computed at one Euro to one U.S. dollar. Room rates are for a double for one night. Meal prices are for two, unless otherwise stated.

Getting there: Delsey Airlines offers direct service from Los Angeles International Airport three days a week. Swissair, Lufthansa, American, KLM, Delta and British Airways have connecting service.

A taxi from Zaventem Airport, eight miles northeast of Brussels, to the city center costs about $30. Airport City Express is a train that links the airport to Brussels’ Gare du Midi in about 25 minutes, for $2 to $3.

Brussels can also be reached by train from London in about three hours on the Eurostar, (800) EUROSTAR, www.eurostar.com, and Paris in 85 minutes on high-speed trains (877) 456-RAIL, www.raileurope.com.

Where to stay: The Conrad Brussels, 71 Ave. Louise, 542-4242, fax 542-4200, www.conradhotels.com, is in a handsome 19th century building in the stylish Avenue Louise shopping district. Rates: $520 to $560 on weekdays, $169 to $209 on the weekend.

The Hotel Metropole, 31 Place de Brouckere, 217-2300, fax 218-0220, www.metropolehotel.com, Brussels’ belle epoque grande dame, is walking distance from the Grand Place. $275 to $325 on weekdays, $115 to $215 on the weekend, including breakfast.

Le Dixseptieme, 25 Rue de la Madeleine, 517 17 17, fax 502-6424, www.ledixseptieme.be, is in a late 17th century townhouse on one of the city’s most historic streets, steps away from the Grand Place. Rates: $170 to $420 on weekdays, $160 and up on the weekend, including breakfast.

The Hotel Manos Stephanie, 28 Chaussee de Charleroi, 539-0250, fax 537-5729, www.manoshotel.com, is quiet and distinguished, near Avenue Louise. Rates: $235 to $260 on weekdays, $125 to $150 on the weekend, including breakfast.

Bed & Brussels, 9 Rue Kindermans, 646-0737, fax 644-0114, www.BnB-Brussels.be. The company books B&B; style accommodations in private homes, a few near the Grand Place and Sablon areas. Rates: $53 to $92.

Where to eat: The Le Pain Quotidien cafe-bakery chain started in Belgium and remains an excellent place for a quick breakfast.

Lunches of quiche and salad, sandwiches or soup that cost $7 to $12 per person are available at Ma Folle de Soeur, 53 Chaussee de Charleroi, 538-2239, a pretty country-style place near Ave. Louise, and Greenhouse Lunch and Tearoom, 43-54 Ave. Louise, 537-4024, with a quiet terrace.

In the Marolles, there’s Indigo, 160 Rue Blaes, 511-3897, a funky cafe near the Place du Jeu de Balle, and Soepbar, 89 Rue Haute, specializing in homemade soups that cost between $4 and $5, on a street lined with antique shops.

Wittamer, 12-13 Place du Grand Sablon, 512-3742, is a confectionery with a terrace cafe on one of Brussels’ most beautiful squares.

There are also excellent cafes in the Belgian Center for Comic Strip Art, 20 Rue de Sables, 219-1980; the Musee Royaux d’art et d’Histoire, 3 Parc du Cinquantenaire, 741-7211; and on the sixth-floor terrace of the Musee Instrumental (Musical Instrument Museum), 2 Rue Montagne de la Cour, 545-0130.

La Truffe Noire, 12 Blvd. de la Cambre, 640-4422, is the most distinguished and lavish place in town, specializing in truffle dishes; $200 to $300.

En Face de Parachute, 578 Chausee de Waterloo, 346-4741, is a smashing small place in Ixelles, featuring such entrees as seafood pot au feu in cream sauce; $75 to $100.

La Quincaillerie, 45 Rue du Page, 533-9833, is in an old Art Deco hardware store and has an inviting oyster bar; $80 to $100.

The Old Inn, 76 Rue Washington, 649-6553, is an old-fashioned restaurant near Place du Chatelain, decorated with a wonderfully kitschy array of Belgian antiques; $75 to $100.

Two classic Grand Place area seafood restaurants are Aux Armes de Bruxelles, 13 Rue de Bouchers, 511-5550; $50 to $150; and Chez Leon, 18 Rue de Bouchers, 511-1415. My prix fixe meal of tomato stuffed with shrimp, mussels, fries and beer was about $25.

What to see and do: The Belgian Center for Comic Strip Art, 20 Rue des Sables, 219-1980; Musee de la Dynastie, 7 Place des Palais, 545-0800, www.musbellevue.be; Brussels City Museum (Maison du Roi), Grand Place, 279-4350; David and Alice van Buuren Museum, 41 Ave. Leo Errera, 343-4851, www.museumvanbuuren.com; Horta Museum, 25 Rue Americaine, 543-0490; Hotel de Ville, Grand Place, 279-4365; Musee Wiertz, 62 Rue Vautier, 648-1718; Musees Royaux d’Art et d’Histoire, 10 Parc du Cinquantenaire, 741-7211, www.kmkg-mrah.be; Musees Royaux des Beaux Arts, 3 Rue de la Regence, 508-3211, www.fine-arts-museum.be; Musical Instrument Museum, 2 Rue Montagne de la Cour, 545-0130, www.mim.fgov.be.

For more information: The main tourist office in Brussels is in the Hotel de Ville on the Grand Place, 513- 8940, fax 513-8320, www.brusselstourism.com. Or contact the Belgian Tourist Office, 780 3rd Ave., Suite 1501, New York, N.Y. 10017; (212) 758-8130, fax (212) 355-7675, www.visitbelgium.com.