Neon

A Former Canteen, a Current Star

The refurbished canteen of a former teacher training college in Lier is not where you would expect to find one of Belgium's more considered starred kitchens. Yet that architectural inheritance shapes the dining experience at Neon in ways a purpose-built restaurant rarely could: the space carries an institutional memory that sits in deliberate contrast to the precision on the plate. Belgium's fine dining geography tends to cluster around Antwerp, Bruges, and Brussels, with tables like Zilte in Antwerp or Boury in Roeselare anchoring the prestige end of the Flemish circuit. Neon occupies a different register: smaller city, lower price point (€€€ against the €€€€ bracket of many peers), and a cooking philosophy that positions sourcing as the structural argument, not a marketing footnote.

What the Kitchen Is Actually Built Around

Country cooking in Belgium has historically meant hearty, generous, and land-rooted. What Neon does is refine that instinct without abandoning it. Chef Nils Proost works with the Vercammen brothers, two young farmers who operate a market gardening business in Koningshooikt, a village a short distance from Lier. The relationship is not a passing supplier arrangement. Vegetables, herbs, and fruit from that farm form the structural backbone of the menus, and their seasonal availability directly determines what Proost can cook. This is the model that distinguishes the more credible farm-anchored restaurants from those that use agricultural imagery without the supply chain to back it up.

For context, Lier already has a small cluster of restaurants working in this territory. Numerus Clausus and Salto both operate in the farm-to-table space in the same city, which makes the local dining scene more coherent than its modest profile might suggest. Across our full Lier restaurants guide, that pattern becomes clearer: this is a town that takes ingredient provenance seriously at multiple price tiers. Internationally, the country cooking model finds its most comparable expressions in places like 21.9 in Piobesi d'Alba and Andrea Monesi at Locanda di Orta, where regional specificity and small-scale supply relationships drive the identity of the cooking.

Five Menus, Twelve Months

The format at Neon is structured around five set menus across the year, each calibrated to a distinct seasonal or micro-seasonal window. This is a more granular approach than the standard summer-autumn-winter-spring division that most seasonal kitchens use. The practical implication for the diner is that the menu you eat in early spring will differ meaningfully from the one available a month later, as green asparagus gives way to other harvests and the kitchen pivots accordingly. Proost has cited green asparagus with celeriac, wild spinach, and lovage as representative of one seasonal expression; belly bacon and cod cheek with sweet potato, white beans, and green curry as another, demonstrating the range from land to sea that the five-menu structure allows.

North Sea fish appears regularly, and meat enters the rotation as whole carcasses rather than selected cuts. The whole-carcass approach is partly an ethical choice and partly a creative constraint: it forces the kitchen to work with every part of the animal and reduces waste by design. That same zero-waste framework drives the fermentation program at Neon, which produces kombucha as one documented output. Fermentation in a fine dining context is no longer novel, but using it as a waste-reduction tool rather than a tasting-menu flourish is a distinction worth noting. Across the Belgian starred circuit, from Hof van Cleve in Kruishoutem to Willem Hiele in Oudenburg, each kitchen develops its own relationship with sustainability and locality. Neon's version is unusually systematic: the sourcing relationship with a named farm, the whole-carcass commitment, and the fermentation-as-waste-reduction all operate as a coherent system rather than isolated gestures.

What Michelin Recognised in 2024

Neon received its first Michelin star in 2024, under its current name and address at Barbara-Vettersplein 4, Berlaarsestraat 23 in Lier. The restaurant was previously known as Petit Cuistot before the rebrand and relocation, which means the star arrived after a period of deliberate repositioning. Michelin's recognition in Belgium carries real weight in the fine dining ecosystem: the country has one of the highest concentrations of starred tables per capita in Europe, which means the bar for distinction is set by a dense competitive field. Earning a star in a small Flemish city, in a non-traditional space, with a menu that foregrounds vegetables over prestige proteins, is a different kind of achievement than earning one in Antwerp or Brussels, where infrastructure and critical attention are more naturally concentrated. For comparison, Bozar Restaurant in Brussels operates in the capital's cultural institution framework; the starred restaurants of Wallonia, including d'Eugénie à Emilie in Baudour and L'Eau Vive in Arbre, illustrate how starred cooking distributes across the country well beyond its urban centres.

The Google review score of 4.9 across 114 reviews is a consistent signal. At that sample size, it reflects a broad pattern of guest satisfaction rather than a small cluster of enthusiastic regulars. It also aligns with the Michelin recognition rather than contradicting it, which is not always the case at tables where critical and popular opinion diverge.

Vegetables in the Lead

The shift toward vegetable-forward menus at serious restaurants is documented across European fine dining over the past decade. What distinguishes Neon's version is that vegetables are not a substitution or an accommodation for non-meat diners; they are the primary creative expression. Mussels arrive with a smoky BBQ character; mushrooms and girolles appear with tarragon vinegar and hazelnut. These are not garnish-level presences. The kitchen's willingness to let a celeriac or a legume carry a dish rather than supporting a central protein reflects a cooking philosophy that has more in common with certain Scandinavian and British kitchens than with classical French-Belgian tradition. La Durée in Izegem and the broader creative French-Belgian circuit (see its profile here) tend to keep protein at the centre; Neon's reorientation is a real departure from that regional convention.

Planning Your Visit

Neon sits at €€€, a price tier that positions it below the €€€€ bracket occupied by much of Belgium's leading Michelin-starred circuit, including Boury and Bartholomeus in Heist. That gap matters for trip planning: Neon offers star-level cooking at a lower outlay than most of its peer group, which makes it a strong anchor for a Lier or Antwerp-area itinerary. The restaurant is on Barbara-Vettersplein 4, Berlaarsestraat 23 in the centre of Lier. Given the five-menu rotation, it is worth confirming which seasonal menu is currently on service before booking, since the kitchen's offer changes more frequently than most tasting-menu formats. Lier is served by the Antwerp rail network and sits under 30 minutes from Antwerp Centraal by train, making it accessible as a day or evening trip from the city without requiring a car. For accommodation and other planning in the area, our Lier hotels guide covers the local options, and our guides to Lier bars, wineries, and experiences round out the broader picture for a full stay.