Coffee 5 Cups @ Plaza Damas 3, Sri Hartamas

Coffee & cakes with a view: Coffee 5 Cups is the latest entry to Plaza Damas 3, blessed with an unparalleled vantage point for surveying the national palace.

More importantly, this cafe is operated with integrity by people who are passionately involved in social activism. Their coffees freshly brewed with hand-picked organic Balinese beans, ensuring fair trade that benefits the coffee farming communities.

Full meals will be served post-elections, starting May 11. Expect everything from open-face sandwiches to sushi & noodles (one of the owners hails from Hokkaido).

For now, house-made cakes like sour cream cinnamon ones (RM6.50) are a true treat here.

Pumpkin syrup cake, moist & lightly sweet, beautiful with a scoop of ice cream.

Coffees reasonably robust; cold caffe latte (RM9.50) hits the spot on a hot afternoon.

Plunger coffee, French press coffee, cafetiere coffee. Whats in a name; that which we call coffee by any other name would taste as tantalizing.

Roasted barley tea, or "mugicha" in Japanese, is one cooling, caffeine-free choice here.

Translated from an Arabic poem (really!): O Coffee! Thou dost dispel all cares, thou art the object of desire to the scholar, this is the beverage of the friends of God.