Roasted with patience.
Twelve kilos at a time, in the back room, three mornings a week.
Precision in every detail.
Every shot weighed in and weighed out. If it runs fast, we pour it away.
A place to slow down.
Long tables, soft music, and nobody hurrying you out.
Made for the moment.
Small-batch roasting, a bar that takes its time, and a room that lets you take yours.
Your neighbourhood
coffee ritual.
Oriel · Specialty coffee
Small-batch roasting, a bar that takes its time, and a room that lets you take yours.
A window on Ashgrove Lane. Careful coffee on one side of the glass, the neighbourhood on the other.
The coffee
Where it grew, how long it roasted, what it tastes of, and how it meets the water. Here is this month's espresso, start to finish.
Coffee is the seed of a cherry. We buy from importers who can tell us the region, the washing station and the people who picked it, and we pay for that information. When a lot runs out, it is gone until next harvest. We think that is how it should be.
We roast twelve kilos at a time on a small drum roaster in the back room. Our espresso roast runs a little over ten minutes, long enough for sweetness, short enough to keep the fruit. Every batch gets logged, cupped the next morning, and adjusted if it needs it.
00 seconds · 0.0g out
Press and hold to pull a 28 second shot. Or press Enter.
Tasting notes are not ingredients. When we say blackcurrant, we mean the coffee has a bright, juicy acidity that reminds us of it. If you just want a good flat white, you will get one, and we will not quiz you about it.
Espresso gets a fixed recipe that we check every hour, because grinders drift as the day warms up. Filter is brewed by hand on V60, or from the batch brewer if you are in a hurry. Both are good. One takes four minutes.
Food
Our pastry kitchen starts at 5:30. By the time the door opens, the knots are cooling and the bread is sliced.
We keep the menu short so everything on it is fresh. Most of it is vegetarian, and there is always something vegan and something gluten free.
Our story
Oriel began with two people who kept walking twenty minutes for a decent coffee, and a corner shop on Ashgrove Lane with a bay window nobody had cleaned in years.
We opened in the spring with one espresso machine, a secondhand roaster and a list of things we would not do. No rushing people out. No coffee snobbery at the counter. No pretending every cup is perfect when it is not.
What we do instead is simple. We buy good coffee and roast it carefully. We weigh every shot. We bake in the morning and sell out in the afternoon. And we learn our regulars' names, because a neighbourhood café is only as good as the people standing in it.
So the street has a room to sit in that is not an office and not a home.
Care about the details so you do not have to. Just enjoy the cup.
Scales, timers and tasting, every hour. Boring, repeated, worth it.
Coffee mornings for new parents, a noticeboard, and a pay-it-forward jar that never seems to empty.
Co-founder · Roaster
Spent eight years behind other people's bars. Roasts on Monday, Wednesday and Friday mornings.
Co-founder · Bakery
Trained as a chef, fell for laminated dough. Responsible for the cardamom knots and the early starts.
Head barista
Knows how most of the street takes their coffee. Will happily talk you through the filter list.
Before you come
Yes. The long table has plugs underneath and the wifi is free. On weekend mornings we keep the window seats laptop free so there is room for everyone.
Completely. Order a flat white or a latte and we will make it as carefully as anything else on the menu. Nobody here will judge your order.
No. Oat, whole and skimmed milk all cost the same.
Our flat white is usually within 20p of the chains on the high street. The difference is where the money goes: traceable coffee, a roast from this week, and people who are paid properly to make it.
Yes. We sell 250 g bags of everything on the menu, roasted within the week. Tell us your brewer and we will grind them for it.
Always. There is a water bowl by the door and, usually, a biscuit behind the counter.
Visit us
We are on the corner, opposite the plane trees. Look for the green awning and the people on the bench.
Contact
Wholesale beans, a morning event, a birthday cake order, or just a question. We reply within two working days.
No bookings for tables. If you are a group of eight or more, give us a day's notice and we will save the long table.