“Cara is a very long-term coffee person, she’s been doing coffee for longer than anyone else I know,” employee at Strange Matter Coffee Co. Santino DallaVecchia, said. “It was just a long standing goal of hers.”

Strange Matter Coffee Co. opened two years ago and has since had a regular crowd of coffee lovers. James Sailor, a Strange Matter Coffee Co. regular, knew Nader before she created her shop and is there almost every day.

“Cara was doing stuff at the farmers market down on Allen Street and I would go there every Wednesday and then when this place opened, I started heading over here pretty regularly,” Sailor said. ”(I come here) close to five days a week. ... (The coffee) tastes better than most of the other places I’ve been to in Lansing.”

One signature of the coffee shop is the foam designs employees create in their oversized teal coffee cups.

Many can’t resist capturing the masterpiece and posting it to social media.

Other techniques used at Strange Matter Coffee Co., is their pour over coffee set up.

Walking toward the coffee bar, it might look as if one is walking into a lab.

“This is a pour over, it’s a way of brewing coffee and it’s really essential to what we do here,” DallaVecchia said. “It’s a very precise and scientifically artistic process. ... It really gives the most authentic taste in coffee.”

This method of brewing coffee is all about controlling the variables, DallaVecchia said.

Although it is a more involved process, It allows them to control the brewing speed.

“It’s sort of a newly popular way of doing coffee ... it’s a combination of factors that makes this more conducive to bringing out the coffee,” DallaVecchia said. “We have water that’s between 200 and 201 degrees, and then it’s a fresh ground mound of coffee, all very freshly roasted beans.”

Current roasters of the shop are Populace Coffee Co., Four Barrel Coffee, Cafe Grumpy and Onyx Coffee Lab.

Along with their handcrafted, high quality coffee brews, they also offer specialty teas by Kilogram Tea and fresh baked goods, specially delivered from Zingerman’s Bakehouse, according to the Strange Matter Coffee Co. website. ch

Though many regulars visit to drink their daily dose of Strange Matter Coffee Co., there is always room for newcomers.

MSU physics professor Marcos Daniel Caballero visited the coffee shop for the first time after hearing about it from a friend. He was working on assignments for his lecture for the upcoming week. ch

“I normally go to Espresso Royale, but I decided today that I’d come here and try it out,” Caballero said. “The coffee is really good, it might get busy and loud but the white noise ... helps me focus.”