Elsen Kaasambacht, Leuven, België

Elsen Kaasambacht - ‘Verfijnd genieten’ – in Leuven, België
Meester Kaasrijper / Maître fromager affineur

One of the best and most attractive food shops I know is Elsen Kaasambacht, a small store which specialises first and foremost in cheese but also offers a beautiful selection of charcuterie of the highest quality, as well as some other ‘gourmet’ food items.

Elsen Kaasambacht naturally offers a very extensive array of Belgian products but the offerings from other EU countries are no less extensive and of the same excellent quality. In the following picture, one can see the shelves holding many of the basic and most easily recognised cheeses from Belgium, the Netherlands, France, Switzerland and Italy (the shop assistant in the photo was preparing a sandwich for me at the moment):


In addition to the impressive offerings of aged cheeses, Elsen Kaasambacht also tempts visitors with beautiful fresh cheeses, including various types of the native platte kaas (plattekeis / fromage blanc) (link) and mozzarella di bufala from two different makers in Campania:


Like the cheese at Elsen Kaasambacht, the charcuterie on offer is also well chosen, perfectly handled and beautifully displayed. Here one can see a number of pork products, primarily from Belgium, Italy and France:


Two of the best sandwiches I’ve eaten in recent memory I got during my recent short return visit to Leuven and both were made at Elsen Kaasambacht. Though I do occasionally enjoy more complex preparations, these two sandwiches were maximally simple, each featuring just one item in addition to the delicious bread (baguette) and butter in which that item was craddled. The first was a sandwich of the outstanding cured sausage from the Ardennes region of Wallonia:


The second sandwich featured one large, folded over slice of one of the most underappreciated but purely delicious dairy products in the world. The cheese in question is of the type known here as ‘Gouda’, in Dutch Goudse kaas, but in the Low Countries this is the basic cheese and unless a given example was produced in Gouda, it tends just to be referred to as kaas, that is, ‘cheese’. In this case, I have especially in mind jonge kaas, i.e., ‘young cheese’. While cheeses of this ‘Gouda’ type are outstanding at various levels of aging, the very young stages, which unfortunately appear to me never to be available in this country, cannot be beat as the topping of a boterham or filling of a sandwich.


Elsen Kaasambacht is located in the heart of my beloved Leuven, the beautiful and vibrant university city that is now the capital of the Province of Vlaams Brabant; the shop stands in the lower stretch of the Mechelsestraat, closed to vehicular traffic, that links the De Layens plein and the Vismarkt:


Eet smakelijk!
Antonius

Elsen Kaasambacht
Mechelsestraat 36
3000 Leuven
België
tel. 016/22.13.10

Another great report Antonius - were you over there recently? Was it around the same time that you were in Oxford?

Those sandwiches look fantastic. That is probably my favorite type of sandwich - good bread, good butter and some good meat or cheese (not too much) and nothing else. It sounds simple enough, but I have rarely been able to make a sandwich over here that tastes like the ones I have had in Europe. Then again, it might just be my imagination idealizing the sandwiches I had when I was younger. Who knows?

A,

Your report made me want to hop a taxi for O'Hare and get to Belgium in time for lunch today!

LionRock:

Thank you!

Yes, indeed, I went from Oxford straight over to Belgium back in September for some r-and-r in the form of b-and-b (books and beer). I made a similar trip a couple of years ago -- first a conference in England and then over to Belgium to visit my friends and old haunts there. That time the trip was in January and it coincided with one of the most bitter cold-snaps in decades for both Southern England and Belgium. This time I was there for a simialrly remarkable hot spell, with nothing but sunshine and (to my mind) wicked temperatures in the 80's (and I'm sure low 90's) throughout. I was bitterly disappointed, hoping instead for a little of the more usual mix of clouds and drizzle and damp chill (which I really do like a lot in reasonable doses and was longing for after the excessive summer we had had here).

Concerning sandwiches, I agree very much. That's not to say that there aren't more complex sandwiches that I enjoy very much, but if everything is of the highest quality, I also really love the focus and simplicity of the bread-butter-one meat or cheese combination. In this case, the two items I got are things I can't get here really, and so there was no question of putting anything else on there. The saucisson d'Ardennes is really delicious (so too the beautiful cured hams of the Ardennes) and that very young (Gouda-style) cheese... It's so ordinary and yet so perfectly exquisite.

Next time I'm over in Belgium, Iim hoping to pass through La Roche en-Ardenne and might stop by this shop:
http://www.ftpser.com/josse/index.htm

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stevez wrote:Your report made me want to hop a taxi for O'Hare and get to Belgium in time for lunch today!

Oh, Steve, if only that were possible once in a while...

Antonius

oh, and see if you can find cheese from Jacquy Cange, affineur:

http://www.jacquycange.be/

Many years ago we imported it but the FDA came down hard on his cheeses (which are not at all like the larger cheeses pictured above). I'm not sure if anyone in the US is bringing it in anymore -- too difficult to do with the Bioterror Act of 2002.

They are definitely worth seeking out.

Queijo:

Thanks for the recommendation and interesting link. I'll have to find some time on my next visit to Belgium and head down into Hainaut and visit Stambruges, where Cange is based (that's about halfway between Tournai and Mons).

Antonius

Tremendous pics, Tony.

I'm salivating over the baguette and saucisson d'Ardennes sandwich. Simple, quality ingredients that speak for themselves. Stellar!