The Journal · Local notes · 3 min

Where We Drink Coffee

Three counters, one back room, and a strong opinion about oat milk from a person who has never been wrong.

We make good coffee at the house. We also leave, every day, to drink somebody else's. These are invented places, as NOIR House is, but they are exactly the sort of place you should be looking for.

The one with four stools

You will know it because it will not look open. One machine, one person, one bean at a time. Do not ask what is good. It is all whatever they are pouring.

A white cup of espresso seen from above on black stone — Black stone counter, very little conversation.

The one behind the florist

Walk through the buckets and down a step. There is a tiled back room with bad chairs and excellent light. Bring a book. Nobody will move you on, and in the late afternoon the whole place smells of cut stems and steamed milk.

The bakery

It is not really a coffee place. It makes our bread and it does a filter coffee in a paper cup for two euros. Stand outside with it at seven and watch the city's vans go by. It is the best thing on this list.

A round floured loaf cooling on a wire rack — Out of the oven by six, on our table by half past seven.

Stand outside with it at seven and watch the vans go by.

NOIR House and the people writing here are fictional. Bruges is not, and it really is worth the train.