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Liège waffles, fries and Trappist beer - that's what they sell everywhere to tourists, but real Brussels specialties are something else entirely. The best place to find them is clearly the Sunday morning market at Place du Jeu de Balle in the Marolles neighbourhood. You'll find farm products there, Belgian cheeses you don't get in France, local charcuterie. The little restaurants around there have been run by families for generations, and they serve stuff like waterzooi, queue à la liégeoise or croquettes aux crevettes grises - nothing like the standard tourist menus.
For charcuterie and local products, you really need to look in the small neighbourhood butcher shops rather than the big commercial streets. Belgian white cheese, beers from local microbreweries (not the globally known brands) - you'll find that in independent cheese shops and little neighbourhood beer bars. The locals themselves don't shop in tourist spots, so watch where the Brussels residents go when they do their shopping.
If you want to eat properly, ask people in the neighbourhood rather than following a guide. The best Brussels spots are the ones where tables are packed together, it's a bit noisy, where you see retired people sitting next to tourists, no background music. That's where you'll get the real thing.
Neighborhood markets like Marché de la Chapelle or Marché des Enfants Rouges are where you'll find the real stuff people actually eat in Brussels without all the tourist nonsense. That said, watch out: there's tons of little "authentic" restaurants near the Grand-Place that sell you reheated frozen food at crazy prices, so aim for places where locals actually go, away from the pedestrian zones. Specialized shops for Flemish charcuterie, artisanal chocolate, or regional beers outside the city center - you'll get way better quality and prices that way.
If you really want to eat like a true Bruselian, don't bother looking in the touristy areas - head to the little neighborhood joints you stumble upon by chance instead. The places locals actually go to, it's like those small cafés where they serve simple but genuine stuff - shrimp croquettes, mussels in white sauce, that kind of thing. The real family restaurants, you'll find those mostly when you get a bit away from the center, toward areas like Saint-Gilles or Ixelles where people actually live their everyday lives.
For actual ingredients, yeah markets are a good idea, but there are also these small specialty shops that sell things you can't find anywhere else - lesser-known Belgian cheeses, quality bread from local bakeries, regional specialties you'd never see in the big chains. That's what really gives you the taste of the region, way more than what they sell to tourists.
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