The Caffeine Chronicles: Salt Review

Update (June 2015): Salt has closed but has been replaced by a great café called The Black Penny.

After my failed attempt to check out the coffee situation at Salt a few weeks ago, I finally made it there yesterday afternoon. It was such a beautiful sunny afternoon that it was gorgeous sitting under the shade of the awning on Great Queen Street, a relatively quiet thoroughfare at the eastern extreme of Covent Garden. I could almost pretend I was in New York.

Salt Espresso, Covent Garden

I ordered my usual macchiato--bonus points for the barista who asked how I liked it (answer: just a dash of milk and a splash of foam), and etched a little heart on top. The coffee was very good: they use Square Mile coffee and my macchiato was rich, chocolatey and flavoursome. Salt also offers a range of sandwiches, cakes and teas (ed: what is this 'tea'?), but it was too hot a day for me to order anything else. The cookies and brownies looked particularly good though.

The macchiato at Salt

Salt is slightly off my usual beaten track but I'm adding it to The Knowledge and will bear it in mind the next time I need a slightly calmer place to drink a high-quality coffee in WC2, without having to deal with the scrum at Monmouth, for instance.

Salt. 34 Great Queen Street, London, WC2B 5AA (Tube: Holborn or Covent Garden). Website. Twitter.