The Wembley Store on St Lucia Street is a dive bar in the most honest sense — small, dark, and entirely unimpressed by the gentrification of Strait Street around it. It has been serving cheap beer to Valletta residents since before the capital of culture boom and shows no sign of updating its formula. Beer is cold, prices are low, and the conversation is local. It is one of the few places in Valletta where you are unlikely to be surrounded exclusively by tourists.
Open from mid-morning through late evening. No food, no cocktails, no pretensions. The bar is useful to know about when you want a drink without the self-consciousness of the Strait Street strip.