♥ YOU CAN TAKE A BELGIAN OUT OF BELGIUM, BUT YOU CAN'T TAKE THE HERRING OUT OF HER FRIDGE ♥

Today, I posted this onto my dad's Facebook: "You can take the Belgian out of Belgium, but you can't take the herring out of her fridge.  Or the mayo out of her fries."

My dad had just posted a picture of the maatjes he'd had for dinner.  Maatjes are raw herring.  

At this point, an acquaintance of ours replied something to the effect that herring made him gag, which is weird because I think he's German or something, and who even knows what they're eating because everything there sounds like "Veenerkugelschnitzelweiner," so by default, herring actually sounds more appealing even if it is more specifically raw baby herring soaked in milk.

I chortled heartily at my own inner dialogue and then posted a picture of the ubiquitous jar of herring I keep in my fridge for those midnight herring cravings (don't judge...).  

Then, I became bored with Facebook, called my mom, and talked to her about herring, and she said she had a jar of it in her fridge, too.

I know at least one of my younger brothers also keeps a jar in his fridge on occasion, for what he refers to as "recreational use."

I'm not sure what it is about Belgians and their herring.  It's a lot like their need for mayonnaise in their fries (they're not French fries, by the by; they're Belgian fries, and all the Belgians know this and we do NOT forgive the French for stealing our idea). 

You know what's even better (better than mayonnaise and better than seething at the French for stealing our fry idea)?  A big plate of maatjes served with homemade-mayo-topped Belgian frietjes served in a newspaper cone.

Another fun tidbit about Belgians: we're are all born instinctively knowing how to make mayonnaise from scratch.  Seriously.  None of that Hellmann's stuff for us.  

You hand your two-year-old Belgian neighbor kid an egg, some oil, and some Dijon (Dijon... see?...now that actually is from France) mustard; hand him a little whisk; and the kid will whip that sh** up into mayonnaise faster than an American kid can hone in on an open bag of Cheetos.  

Okay, maybe not that fast, but it's a close second.

In the end, it was a unanimous decision by me that the title of this post should be an official saying, because it's incredibly accurate (it was also a unanimous decision by others that it should not be a saying, but this is my space, so, hey, them's the breaks).

Pass the herring, my Belgian friends.