COFFEE & strangers

An espresso bar attached to a coffee institute

The bar in Sliema is one half of a business whose other half is a school. COFFEE & strangers runs a Coffee Institute and lab alongside the counter, describing itself as Malta's only accredited and licensed institute in coffee education and science, with accreditation tied to the Specialty Coffee Association and the Coffee Quality Institute.

That is not decoration on a café. Q Grader courses, workshops and professional training run out of the same operation as the espresso bar, along with wholesale and events work. The events side runs to weddings, corporate occasions and team-building sessions, a wider remit than a café counter usually carries, and an online store and a set of brew guides extend it past the room itself. The house line, “Brew. Train. Experience.”, is a fair summary of the order those three things come in.

What the recognition is for

European Coffee Trip named it Malta's country winner in 2025, which is the clearest external marker of the bar's standing. The award came in the same year its training programme was running SCA and CQI accredited courses, so the two sides of the business support each other rather than sitting apart.

What that means in practice is a bar built for coffee rather than for laptops. Expect espresso-bar service, conversation across the counter and a room organised around the drink, not a co-working room where the coffee is incidental. The learning side is open to visitors too, through workshops and courses rather than only through the cup.

Espresso, hand brew and a pastry

The two things to order are the espresso and the hand brew filter, which between them cover the bar's whole approach: one for the house's espresso work, the other for a cleaner read on the coffee itself.

Milk drinks are worth a mention because of what goes into them. ROA Coconut Mlk is the plant milk on the bar, developed for coffee, tea and matcha, with enough microfoam for latte art and a creamy texture that holds up in an espresso drink. A set of named coffee partners sits behind the wholesale side of the business, which is another sign of how far the operation reaches past the counter. For food, the bar keeps to cakes and pastries, which is the right scale for a place whose real subject is what is in the cup.