End of an era for Hof Van Cleve as restaurant to change hands at the end of the year: Peter Goossens to pass over the helm to Floris Van Der Veken

Peter Goossens and his wife Lieve Fermans  have announced that they will quit the highly acclaimed Belgian restaurant Hof Van Cleve which has been open since 1986 at the end of 2023. 

Considered to be the contemporary father of Belgian cuisine, Peter Goossens will pass on the helm of the restaurant to his executive chef Floris Van Der Veken who will change his role to becoming the owner of the restaurant and its over 20 staff.

The restaurant, one of only 3 Michelin star restaurants in Belgium and one of very few restaurants in the World that have remained in the World’s 50 Best restaurants list for more than 15 years will change hands on 1 January 2024.

The 57-year-old chef that he and his wife had been thinking about this decision for the past few years also to give a new direction to their professional lives. In fact, Peter Goossens will be opening a new restaurant at Hotel La Reserve in Knokke.

The Belgian chef is confident that his right hand man Floris is the person that has all the potential to write a new chapter for the award-winning restaurant. “Like others who came before him, it was only a matter of time before he would leave to open his own restaurant. In this regard, he is the same as Michael Vrijmoed or Maarten Bockaert who worked for many years here before they left to open their highly successful restaurants,” he said.

Van Der Weken said that he would continue to follow the heart and style of the restaurant that has made the restaurant one of the best in the world for such a long time while at the same time slowing giving personal touches to the restaurant both in terms of the food and the service. Over the past years, Peter Goossens has allowed Floris to add his own personal touches to some dishes so this is a role that he can fulfil without any shadow of doubt.

The successful restaurant has been at the forefront of Belgian gastronomy since at least 2004 when it scored an impressive 19.5 in Gault&Millau and the clinched three Michelin stars in 2005. It has retained the stars and that score since then. More exceptionally it is one of the remaining legendary restaurants to have been in the World’s 50 Best Restaurants List consistently since its first appearance in 2006 thought there were a few years when it made it to the elongated 51-100 list.

In the 2022 list, the restaurant made it to the 27th position confirming how much it is still appreciated in the world of gastronomy.