La Boule Bleue is a Rwandan restaurant. I’m a Rwandan myself along mom’s side and Congolese long dad’s side. My family lives quite far away and unfortunately we don’t see each other very often during the year. Once in a while they all come together and we have dinner in the restaurant La boule bleue. It has become a kind of our regular restaurant. We have already spent many birthdays of family members there. I attach a lot of importance to this restaurant. I really feel at home there and they make such beautiful memories.
La Boule Bleue is located in the Chausseé de Wavre in the African Matongé district in Brussels municipality of Ixelles. The district was named after a district in Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of Congo. It is not far from the Lang Levenstraat and the Naamspoortgelerij with loud African rhythms. Matongé has many trendy bars, restaurants and colourful fabric shops. Africa colours the streets, fruit stalls show their exotic wares. The manioc, large plantains, groundnuts and other peppers give you an inviting smile. The hairdressing salons turn in overdive, always crowded, always cozy chats.
As I mentioned, La Boule Bleue is a Rwandan restaurant. Rwanda is a small country located in central Africa bordering Burundi, Tanzania, Uganda and Congo-Kinshasa. Because the country is so small it has no large regional cuisine. Rwandans eat mostly local grown ingredients, mainly corn, beans, peas, sweet potatoes and fruit. The food is served in a buffet form. You can choose what and how much you eat!
The traditional dishes you can eat in the restaurant are:
Mizuzu: Fried baked bananas
Umutsima: Dish consisting of corn and cassava
Goat skewers: Roasted goat meat
Isombe: Green leaves that come off a plant and are then crushed and mixed with dried fish
The drinks:
Rwandans like to drink beer. It is a tradition to drink with a straw. One of the most popular drinks is ikigage. Dist is a local alcoholic beverage made from urwarwa and dry sorghum. Whatever you can drink there is urgwagwa, a kind of banana beer. This one is personally my favorite. It is very fresh and pleasant to drink.
I really feel at home there. It reminds me every time I travel in Rwanda. The smell of the food, the music but especially the warm atmosphere. What I do regret is that people often have to wait a long time to order drinks. But this is the only downside I can give.
