Middletown CoffeeCo

Jonathan and Emma Hickinson have run Middletown Coffee Co from 60-64 Lower Mill Street in Ballymena since 2015. The café built its early reputation on competition coffee, winning the Northern Ireland Aeropress Championship the same year it opened, then taking both the regional and overall Café of the Year titles at the 1st Irish Café Awards in 2018. Coffee remains the focus, with a rotating weekly bake made on site and a free tasting session held every Friday lunchtime where customers sample coffees from half a dozen or more origin countries. The café opens Monday to Saturday and closes on Sundays, still trading from the same Lower Mill Street corner it started on.