5 questions with ST. ALI owner, Salvatore Malatesta
ST. ALi was created to showcase the best of Melbourne food and coffee. An eclectic, fun and welcoming space to meet with friends, relax on your own or celebrate a milestone event. One of the pioneers in Melbourne specialty coffee, now renowned around the world, the vision was to combine great coffee with the best café food – over a decade and half later, the party’s only just getting started!
As a regular customer at ST. ALi and recognising the wide cross-section of customers passing through ST. ALi every day, Lightning Broadband CEO Jeremy Rich first approached us in 2018 about a co-lab to provide customer Wi-Fi in the café. After some research on their service and testimonials validating their service, we got up and running and never looked back. Such was the speed and reliability of the service we moved our roasting facility and head office across to Lightning Broadband as soon as we could.
It’s a cliché these days, but the best thing about living in Melbourne is definitely the diversity of cultures and pastimes we are exposed to. Whether you’re into food, sports, the arts or all three, whatever you feel like doing on a given day, you’ll most likely be able to find somewhere to experience it! And the way that diversity has spread around the state now, when you head away for a weekend or a longer break, you can continue to experience those same things wherever you are.
St. ALi derives its name from Ali ibn Umar al-Shadhili, a fourteenth-century Sufi cleric from the mystical Sufism branch of Islam. Al-Shadhili spent time in the court of the sultanate in Southern Ethiopia, where he learned of a strange berry that promoted wakefulness, which he took back with him to Yemen. As Yemen is generally recognised to have introduced coffee to the rest of the world, he is now considered to be the patron saint of coffee.
The coffee preferences of the crew at ST. ALi are just about as diverse as they are! A morning favourite is always an espresso and a flat white, but for true appreciation of flavour and specific origin characteristics, nothing beats a filter coffee. Kenya, Ethiopia and Costa Rica are always guaranteed to put a smile on your face!
