Beijing restaurants

Best Belgian Restaurant in Beijing

Posted on by Gilbert Van Kerckhove

Three Michelin Stars

Renaat Morel is the three Michelin stars chef who now does not want any stars anymore but is the proud owner of the best Belgian Restaurant in Beijing. Or should we say, in China.
Morel’s Restaurant is the only one in Beijing offering genuine Belgian cuisine in a charming interior. The menu of traditional Belgian and French dishes is composed by the celebrated chef Renaat who previously served Royalty and famous stars in the South of France.
The famous TRB, Hulu and more managed by Belgian Ignace Lecleir are great places to enjoy the best of European cuisine.

The first batch of Beijing International Food Lists jointly recommended and released by Beijing Cuisine Association and Meituan came out recently, a shortlist of the most famous restaurants.
According to report, in order to ensure the professionalism, fairness, and impartiality of the list, only 123 restaurants were selected from more than 150,000 restaurants through the recommendations of the association and experts. Among them, 41 Beijing cuisine restaurants were selected as the “Beijing Year Restaurant List”, 57 provincial and municipal restaurants in Beijing were selected into the “Shenzhou Delicious Full List”, and 25 foreign restaurants were included in the “International Gourmet Collection List”.
Morel’s Restaurant and Café was one of the top foreign restaurants and Renaat Morel received his certificate in August 2022.

The restaurant has been in the same location for far over 20 years, a real feat as so many restaurants open and disappear.
The evolution of the customer base is remarkable. In the first decade the vast majority of the customers were foreigners. In recent years at least 80% of the customers are Chinese – who are also bigger spenders!

It is also very much in demand for birthday celebrations!
The take-away and delivery has become an important contribution to the revenue, when a few years ago that service did not even exist.

A famous couple

The restaurant is run by Renaat and Susan, his wife. Susan is also a great florist and the flowers you see – and receive – are of the highest quality.

The restaurant has been featured in innumerous media, and was already mentioned in Beijing Weekend in June 2000.

Chef Renaat has an imposing track record, already mentioned in detail in a previous post.

So many TV shootings were done that it’s impossible to mention all. See:
“Chinese Destiny” is a documentary program about cross-cultural characters produced by the Chinese Global Program Center of China Media Group. “Foreign chefs in Beijing” (short appearance of … Gilbert)

Earlier in 2022 several days of invasion by CCTV4 in Morel’s Restaurant and Café for a documentary about Renaat and his restaurant, shown worldwide.

On 16 September 2018 Renaat Morel was decorated in the Belgian Embassy, in the presence of the Ambassador, the Governor of the Province of Antwerp and many guests.

What about the food?

That is another long story, to be published soon!

Renaat Morel was decorated in the Belgian Embassy

Posted on by Gilbert Van Kerckhove

Residence of the Belgian Ambassador

On 16 September 2018 Renaat Morel was decorated in the Belgian Embassy, in the presence of the Belgian Ambassador Marc Vinck, the Governor of the Province of Antwerp Mrs. Cathy Berx and many of the Belgian community and friends.
Renaat Morel is the chef and owner of the Belgian Restaurant Morel’s. Also decorated was Zeng Su, Chief Representative of POM Antwerp in Chongqing.
The event took place well before the pandemic hit us all. In the pictures you can see many of the people who left Beijing since then.
Yes, I took too long time to post this…

Above some pictures showing the guests.

Officier In De Leopoldsorde – Officer in the Order of Leopold

That is the title of the decoration for our friend Renaat. We are all proud of the chef and grateful for spoiling us with the food.

See the pictures of the ceremony where the Ambassador. Governor, Renaat and others also took the stage.
I was myself decorated on 21 November 2004 in the embassy as “Chevalier de l’Ordre de la Couronne – Ridder in de Kroonorde – Knight of the Order of the Crown”. Belgium has several decorations see an overview.

The food and drinks

Of course food and drinks was done by the Belgian Restaurant Morel’s and his team.

As always the guests enjoyed the gorgeous buffet.
As I was busy taking pictures you have to find me somewhere…

Never Leaving left Beijing

Posted on by Gilbert Van Kerckhove

Another victim

In late 2019 we had a nice evening in “Lenore’s Bar – never Leaving”. Well sadly Never Leaving left Beijing, I guess another victim of greedy landlords, crazy rents and COVID.
Location was at the former Hacker-Pschorr on Xindong Lu, a bit north of Jingkelong Supermarket. That place must be bad karma, as Hacker-Pschorr went bust before, a huge investment (many million euro) wasted because of totally incompetent Chinese management.
The amount of bars and restaurant closing in Beijing is staggering, made worse with the COVID tragedy.

It was a nice place

Actually I liked the place, the interior was attractive, the service was trying its best even as it was still new. Beer and food were all pretty OK. See the pictures.

I only felt sorry I did not have the chance to visit it more, but in early 2020 COVID came and you know the rest of the story.
There is a new kind of pub there but I did not explore it yet.

CCTV4 in Morel

Posted on by Gilbert Van Kerckhove

Never-ending

For several days invasion of CCTV4 in Morel ’s Restaurant and Café.
They are preparing a documentary about Renaat and his restaurant, to be shown worldwide. Not a surprise as Renaat has an impressive track record, see my previous post.
There were interviews with Renaat, Susan, with Renaat and myself. Then shooting in the kitchen, Renaat eating his famous fish soup, Willem eating mussels (poor guy, they were cold in the end), Renaat going to the market, Renaat in video call with Belgium, plus shooting pictures of some of the dishes… Several days to shoot, it seemed like never to end.

The crew seemed to think the restaurant was theirs, for once we were lucky as no customers were flooding in. And no any noise please!

Sometimes frustrating

I found the CCTV team not to be as professional as the BTV team I worked with recently, see earlier post.
Constant program changes, new questions, and again new questions, failure to be allowed to shoot in the market…
Annoying also: I had my CHIMAY polo shirt with a small logo, I thought cool because it’s a famous Belgian beer and we are in a Belgian place. No no no, no any logos allowed. No showing of beer brands. Not even to mention the concerns of self-censorship and related.
Working with Chinese media can be a real pain and frustration. And nothing we can do about it.

Old China Hands 4 March lunch

Posted on by Gilbert Van Kerckhove

Good attendance

Old China Hands 4 March lunch had 33 participants, again a great get together to enjoy the great food and companionship. No special “event”, just having fun.

Another famous OCH

This time (finally) a focus on Renaat Morel, the owner and chef of Morel’s Restaurant and Café.
He has been in the same spot for over twenty years, a real feat as so many restaurant come and go.
He came to China a looong time ago, to actually start up the air catering business and much more. What many people do not know is his past as a celebrated chef in France. I have been trying to trace back some of his accomplishments, here listed in the latest draft.

See: Renaat Chef

He has served the famous people as you will see.
In Beijing he is also very well know and has many interviews and articles in the Chinese media.
Here one of the latest in TheBeijinger.
See: 19 December 2021 https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/sJ-S5BNN2vwRFS7VHZMVzg

The full article: 211219 MorelTheBeijinger

Yes you will see me there a lot as I not only love the food but also meeting my friends there.

See here some of my favorite dishes: the gratin of endive and ham (see here more!), spaghetti, chateaubriand.
You will not find the same quality in other locations (and surely not at that price). Even the spaghetti…