Is Chez Clément's kitchen 100% homemade?
By Lorenzo Eeman, Brasserie Chez Clément · Updated 2026-05-21
Quick answer
Chef Vincent De Laloy's stated philosophy is “everything made in-house”, stocks, sauces, pastry and finishing produced by the brigade of thirty-two on site. Bread is sourced from the bakery Au Petit Fils (Rue des Combattants) and the tarts come from Les Tartes de Chaumont-Gistoux, with all desserts otherwise made in-house.
This is a question that deserves the most precise possible answer because the “fait maison” label has a specific meaning in the Belgian and French brasserie culture. At Chez Clément, the stated and operational philosophy of chef Vincent Frédéric De Laloy is everything made in-house. That covers the load-bearing parts of a brasserie kitchen: stocks built from real bones, sauces produced from scratch, pastry and dessert components done on site, finishing executed in service. This is the rigour that he inherited from his Michelin-starred grandfather (Chez Grégoire, 1960s) and reinforced through his CERIA training and his four pre-1996 kitchens.
For a brasserie that serves 200 to 300 covers per service, more than 1,400 covers a week, this is a substantial operational commitment. Industrial shortcuts, powdered stocks, frozen pre-prepared sauces, factory pastry, would save labour hours and cost. Vincent has chosen not to take them. That is why he runs a brigade of thirty-two, a sized team that includes a kitchen porter who has been here for twenty years. The cost is real, and so is the difference on the plate.
For full transparency on auxiliary items: bread is sourced from the bakery Au Petit Fils on Rue des Combattants, and tarts come from Les Tartes de Chaumont-Gistoux (a baker-patissier partner). Every other dessert and component of the carte is produced in-house. This kind of granular transparency is what the everything-made-in-house philosophy actually demands.
For a curious British visitor, the practical point is the following: when you order the cabillaud florentine (Vincent's signature), the carbonnade flamande, the croquettes aux crevettes grises, the vol-au-vent à la financière, or the anguilles au vert, you are eating a brasserie carte built on house stocks and house technique. Around this core, seasonal pivots (autumn game, spring asparagus, mussels in season, eels in season) follow the same logic. The result is a level of taste depth that you cannot fake with industrial shortcuts.
- Stated philosophy: everything made in-house.
- Scope of the philosophy: stocks, sauces, pastry, breads, finishing.
- Brigade behind the standard: 32 people on the line.
- Volume served at this standard: 200 to 300 covers / service, > 1,400 covers / week.
- Stability indicator: kitchen porter in the same role for 20 years.
- Family heritage: Michelin-starred grandfather (Chez Grégoire, 1960s).
- Named external partners (exception to the in-house rule): bread from the bakery Au Petit Fils (rue des Combattants in La Hulpe); tart line from Les Tartes de Chaumont-Gistoux; coffee from the Belgian roaster Masalto.
- Practical consequence on the plate: deep stocks, real sauces, taste continuity across decades.
- What it is not: an industrial brasserie running on pre-prepared sauces or frozen components.
To taste the result of the everything-made-in-house standard, reserve at brasseriechezclement.be/reservation.