Flat whites worth the detour

Ten years of chasing Sunday gig lineups has given me a decent ear and apparently a bottomless tolerance for oat milk surcharges. This is the shortlist that survived — places I'd actually get off the sofa for, ranked on the stuff that matters: does the espresso have body, does the barista know what a pre-infusion is, and is there somewhere to sit that isn't a radiator. E17 does most of the heavy lifting because I'm lazy, but a few trips east of the Lea made the cut too.