Box-batter waffles cooked in a budget iron might have seemed good. Then along comes Philippe Leroux and his authentic Belgian Liège waffles to upset the Aunt Jemima establishment.
It’s a weekday afternoon in Steveston, on the eve of International Waffle Day on March 25 (yes, there is such a thing), and Leroux slides one of his creations across a small table inside Damien’s Belgian Waffles, a business the pastry chef has owned since 2007. He sweetens the pot with a French press coffee.
If this grid-patterned pastry was an art, Leroux would be some kind of Cézanne.
“What we do is more traditional — the old style waffle from a long time ago. No eggs inside,” says the 46-year-old, a history lesson at the ready.
“They have no eggs because great grandma didn’t have a fridge. They’d buy the waffles, put them in a metal box and (store it) in the cellar. You can keep them for a week or more.”
Leroux bought the Chatham Road business from an entrepreneur who named it after his son. Leroux has been carrying on the tradition of selling waffles made with dough—not pancake batter—using real butter, honey and Belgian pearl sugar. He’s also upped the griddle game by filling his glass counter with flavours well beyond vanilla.
Leroux was born in Lille, a city in France near the Belgian border. Being so close to the country known for waffles, they’re easy to find here — not so much in other areas of France, where pastries such as croissants and brioche rule. Whatever pastry chefs were making, a young Leroux couldn’t help but stop and look.
“I don’t know if you’ve ever been to France, but if you look at certain pastry shops, it’s crazy; it’s very nice what they do. And I thought, ‘How do they do that?’”
So, after high school, he studied the art, completing a three-year apprenticeship. He became a travelling pastry chef, working in France, elsewhere in Europe and, in 1994, Canada.
“I moved to Canada to learn English and stay a few years,” he says.
He found work in pastry shops, restaurants and hotels around the country, including resort towns of Banff — where he met his wife Miho — and Whistler. In Vancouver he worked at the longstanding French restaurant Le Crocodile and also taught at Pacific Institute of Culinary Arts, where on his first day he challenged students to make a hot soufflé for the school’s restaurant. But it was becoming clear to Leroux that he wanted his own business.
He learned about Damien’s in Steveston. It was up for sale after a year in operation, as the original owner was returning to Europe. Leroux bought it, added his own touches and expanded the waffle offerings to walk-in and wholesale customers — from vanilla and chocolate to green tea and savoury.
Running the business with his wife, and balancing family life with two school-aged kids, is busy. Leroux works a minimum of 55 hours each week, or more than 70 hours a week during busy times such as Chinese New Year.
And this being Steveston, he can’t take weekends off.
“Steveston is busy Saturday, and Sunday. It’s hard to take a day off,” he said. “I’m off mostly Mondays and it’s hard to plan something too long because I have to pick up kids from school.”
Still, Leroux might manage a workout and meet friends on a day off — or, if the stars align, go skiing. When dining out, he skips the chains and looks for small corner restaurants — ones that value quality and ingredients like he does.
“I’ve been raised like that,” he said. “It’s like if you make cookies at home. If you (use) butter, whatever you do —, except if you burn them — you’re good. But if you use margarine or crappy ingredients, you will have crappy food.”
For those who are wary of butter, Leroux has an easy counter-argument: his grandmother and great-grandmother were raised on it and both lived until age 99.
“I’m not going to do 99...but you can eat,” says Leroux, who eats two to three waffles each week. “Moderation, that’s it.”
