No. 25a Old Market – cafe/bar review

No. 25a Old Market quietly opened its doors as Massive Attack and friends were partying at their all-day festival.

While half of Bristol was getting drenched on the Downs, visitors to this new cafe-cum-deli-cum-bar found a far more sedate but no less cool place to be.

From the same team as No. 12 Easton, it shares much of the same feel – just the latest version of owner Chris Williams’ dream hang-out.

On Monday morning, cool as ice Chris was busy showing a few of the first customers around the new premises, which is bigger than at first glance – just look down and you’ll see a basement seating area with comfy leather sofas.

Accessed via a curving staircase, it shares a feature copper wall with the ground floor.

“Can I touch this?” one customer asks Chris as she walks down the stairs. She reaches out one hand. “Oh my god, it’s amazing.”

Almost one entire wall upstairs is taken up with shelving – soon to be accessed by a sliding library ladder and already stocked with pasta, fruit juices, eggs, flour, chocolate, tea and coffee.

Like at No. 12, there is also a selection of magazines including back copies of the New Yorker and Bristol’s own Ernest Journal.

In the middle of the room is a hefty concrete table which fitted through the front door with millimetres to spare. It’s still very early days but the one dish that has been eaten most here already is the smoked ox cheek cheese toastie. It’s a thing of beauty and worth a visit here for just one bite.

Harry behind the bar describes the coffee as old skool. Grown in Peru at 2,050 metre above sea level, and roasted to Chris’ own exacting standards by Extract in St Werburgh’s, it has tasting notes in the cup of cocoa, hazelnut and brown sugar.

As one new customer checked out the deli options in the chiller – milk, cheese, bacon, sausages and chicken – Chris walked in one door downstairs and then returned out of another on the ground floor, having taken his latest small tour group into the secret garden out the back.

Flapjacks, cakes and other sweet treats on the concrete-topped copper counter had been made that morning in the kitchen at No. 12, with pastries from Farro available from Thursday into the weekend.

If goodies from one of Bristol’s best bakeries wasn’t good enough news, an alcohol license just secured will soon see a beery collaboration with St Phillip’s brewery Good Chemistry. Cans of Moor Beer are already in boxes on the shelves ready for sale soon.

Chris greets more new customers like old friends, his dream hang-out soon becoming your own new favourite.

No. 25a, 25a Old Market Street, Bristol, BS2 0HB

www.instagram.com/25a_oldmarket/

Read more: Alex Does Coffee – cafe review