Grocer & Grain

I feel healthy. I feel like I want to create incredible homemade projects from various spices, seasoning, seeds, vegetables, berries, breads. That’s what Grocer and Grain does to me.
When I ventured here by mistakes I was with a Nutritionist. This is now her favourite place in Brighton and you can easily see why. Fresh healthy food makes this place an Aladdin’s cave of new exciting tastes and food.
Personally, I had a Mocha and it was very yummy. We then sat outside, basked in the sun and enjoyed our drinks.

This was a nice find on a pleasant stroll from the station to the beach it is not on the main street, but can be clearly seen on a nearby corner. Welcome and interesting presentation is complemented by a friendly approach to service when you venture in. The home baking is very tempting (and tastes delicious) and the coffee is excellent. It is a shop rather than a café, so most will probably take way their coffees, but there are a couple of crate tables underneath the shop’s awning. Well worth a visit.

Some businesses come and go. There isn’t much call for type-​writer ribbon these days. And I guess that snuff factories don’t now do the business that once meant they prospered. And in recent years travel agents and video rentals seem to have disappeared.
So the clever people at Grocer and Grain saw that. This used to be a video rental store. There’s still a small selection of vids and DVDs for rent, discreetly in the corner. But as one trade wanes, another waxes. And this is Brighton after all. A nice little shop on the corner, not far from the railway selling nice food, lovely cold cuts, cheese and grains or all sorts was always going to win. That’s Grocer and Grain.
It’s a place where you go to «get a few bits». For me, I love the very fresh free range eggs from Kent that roll in at 20p each. In my more environmentally sound moments I’ll go and get my ethically sound Ecover refills there too. You bring your bottle along and they fill it up: great idea.
A pleasant little shop, handily placed for commuters and locals, and a clever bit of business transformation.

Formerly a rather tacky video rental place, this shop has recently been transformed beyond all recognition into this lovely delicatessen-​come-​grocer.
You could easily walk right past this little place en route to Brighton station if you don’t know where to look for it, as it’s tucked away in one of the side streets off Queen’s Road. It’s well worth hunting out though especially if, like me, you’re a big fan of independent local grocery stores.
Selling stuff like locally produced Sussex cheese, the most delicious looking freshly prepared sausages, gluten-​free pastas, chutneys, jams and organic fruit and veg, this is a must-​visit for all you Brightonians determined to buy local but looking for something a bit unique.

A former video rental store, the owners Lizzie & Hakan Toklu have transformed it into a lovely neighbourhood deli, with a wide range of organic produce, plants, wonderful bread, takeaway snacks — and it still rents movies. It has a trendy look, with old crates for shelves. Try their pizza slices at lunchtime.

Grocer and Grain looks like it’s been cut out of a Home and Garden feature and dropped unceremoniously into its insalubrious surroundings. Uncomfortably nestled between a porn shop and a busy road, it still manages to convey the impression of being distinctly upper-​crust bohemian. Indoors is a wonderland of rustic cereal and distressed wooden crates — its interior is more carefully co-​ordinated than a stage show, and as a result it displays even the most ordinary of things so beautifully that they look more desirable than practical. Its bakery/​takeaway snack menu is a good idea, although on the expensive side, but it’s all organic and homemade. It’s a more welcoming atmosphere than you might expect from the outside, but still perhaps a little awkward to browse — although the girl behind the counter was very friendly, I sensed that there might well be a draconian boss behind the scenes keeping a sharp eye on business. Although the fruit outside looks lovely from a distance, it seems like a strange idea up close, as the fumes from the road settle cloyingly onto the shiny red apples. The whole shop seems like it’s more for looking at than actually eating, although it’s a good view if you turn your back to the road. If only one could transplant it to, say, Rottingdean, it would be lovely, but currently it seems to be in denial about its surroundings and rather a strange butterfly in this street of beasts.

From the outside, Grocer & Grain looks like the kind of posh deli you’d stumble across in Spitalfields or Notting Hill. The signage is pure Farrow & Ball and there’s wooden crates artfully displaying mountains of butternut squash, sweet potaties and oranges.
Two steps inside however, and you realise the owners have created more of a post-​modern corner store with everything from fresh fruit and vegetables, organic eggs, milk and cheese to homemade cakes, soups and palm-​sized quiches. The majority of it looks lip-​smackingly good and is priced reasonably with coffee, pastries and salads to take away for commuters. Handily, they also sell big bags of rice, pasta, pulses and herbs and lots of Ecover household and cleaning products.
In a strange twist, they also stock a small variety of rental DVDs from the owner’s previous business — so you can pick up a blockbuster or rom-​com with your grains and groceries!

Grocer and Grain is a peculiar concept. A shop which from the outside seems to be an upmarket greengrocers, and on the inside a wholefoods shop or delicatessen, it actually conceals an incongruent surprise: it’s a DVD rental store.
The fruit and veg is better than decent, if quite pricey, and the various dried and preserved foods, pastas, pulses and breads form an impressive range of ingredients if you’re planning on cooking up something a little bit special. Herbs and spices are especially cheap, high quality and there’s a fair old variety of them too.
Nestled in amongst all off this, round a corner and in a small square room, is Grocer and Grain’s film department. A great selection of films packed into a small area, from classic ‘80s Hollywood action movies and even older Hollywood comedies to contemporary cinema from all over the world, all for between £2 and £4 per title.
It’s dead central, just off Queen’s road towards the station end, 5 minutes from the Laines, Churchill square, or Seven Dials. If you’re thinking of a night in, but your cupboards are bare and you’ve watched all of your films four times, Grocer and Grain’s a good shout.

Just a little bit off the beaten track, and just in front of the Brighton Railway Station is hybrid of a market that sells everything from organic groceries to DVDs.
Grocer & Grains is great alternative to M&S is you are looking for some fresh produce. You can buy all of your dinner making needs here, and rent a movie all at the same time. You can also pick up something living, like a potted plant if your windowsill is feeling a little bit lonely.
At 60p for a big batch of cinnamon sticks, I would say that Grocer & grain is the right value for right amount. It did seem a little bit cheaper than other markets in the area, which is great if you just spent £24 on a ticket to London!