Heyma Yemeni Coffee & Brunch

Heyma opened its Berkeley cafe on University Avenue near San Pablo in October 2023, one of the arrivals The Oaklandside identified that year as a new wave of Yemeni coffee shops bringing added spice and late hours to the region's cafe scene. The San Francisco outpost sits at 248 Ninth Street in western South of Market, a stretch better known for nightclubs and late-night food than for anywhere to sit without a drink in hand. Heyma serves no alcohol, and its trading hours make it one of the strongest alcohol-free evening options in the city: 7am to 11:30pm Sunday through Thursday and 7am to midnight on Friday and Saturday, which is later than most licensed bars in the surrounding blocks stop serving food.

The drinks are the traditional Yemeni set, built on whole spices rather than syrup pumps. The Heyma Latte is richly spiced with cardamom and cinnamon. Aden tea — the Yemeni black tea usually written adeni — is cooked with cardamom, ginger and cream until it is closer to a small dessert than a cup of tea. Mufawaar, the third of the house staples, is the spiced coffee finished with cream that gives most Yemeni menus their signature. Beyond those, the counter runs a conventional espresso programme with the pistachio and chocolate variations the category has made popular, and there is a kitchen: the venue trades as Heyma Yemeni Coffee & Brunch and puts out a full brunch menu through the day, which means an evening visit can be a meal rather than only a drink. The room is set up for staying, with communal seating and a steady late crowd, and its position beside the Ninth Street corridor gives people leaving nearby venues somewhere alcohol-free to end the night. That combination — a spiced drinks list built on cardamom, ginger and cinnamon, a kitchen running through the day, and a midnight close on weekends — is the pattern The Oaklandside identified when it wrote about the category's arrival in the Bay Area, and Heyma's San Francisco room is one of the clearest examples of it in the city.