They’re a smart lot over at the Flour Pot bakery in Seven Dials. Marching steadily but sassily across the city, from Sydney Street in 2014 to Elm Grove to Fiveways, zigzagging back to First Avenue, they sashayed in to Seven Dials in 2017. Bringing us unbeatable bread and a coffee culture that spread onto the pavements and into a reclaimed secret garden, wherever the Flour Pot went, we followed.
They were even among the leaders in the hospitality revolution during Lockdown, swivelling their business plan when all doors were closed to scoop up the smallest but greatest local suppliers – Gunn’s the Florist, Smors hummus, cheese from the Cheeseman and Curing Rebels charcuterie – in a genius home delivery service.
And so when Small Batch was suddenly gone, leaving landlord Pembertons a vacant space until October when they can issue a new lease, Flour Pot boss, Oli Hyde spotted an opportunity. “I decided that if we could put together a crack team of local businesses, The Flour Pot, Curing Rebels, Curio Wines, a local artist called She Paints, we could create a collaborative space here.” In partnership with Pembertons, Night Shift was born. “We asked ourselves; ‘what would the Flour Pot be if it was open at night?’” he said. “I don’t know what the future holds, but it seemed an absolute crying shame having such a site like this empty for that period of time.”
When we met, Night Shift had been open just three days, but already the locals were pouring in. Oli, who started his hospitality days at Terre a Terre in the 90s, moving to Sam’s in the heydays of the Dials, through clubs like Audio and Excape and on to the Mesmerist, knows how a thing or two about the night shift. “I think this is a lovely idea’ he says. “ It’s just early evening Wednesday to Saturday, closing at 10 or 11, depending on the numbers, and offers a local British charcuterie, a terrific wine list and local art on the walls.”
In June our newly elected Mayor Cllr. Jackie O’Quinn unveiled this memorial at no. 7 Buckingham Place to a painter who was born and educated in Sussex and who distinguished himself as a marine painter but who was also an accomplished musician who played for many years in the orchestra of the Theatre Royal in New Road. His painting of “HMS Vengeance at Spithead” hangs in the Royal Pavilion whilst his painting “Queen Victoria Landing at Brighton” is in the collection of the Brighton and Hove Museum. Among the guests at the unveiling were relatives of the artists including Captain Brian Nibbs, a distinguished master mariner whose long service in the Royal Naval Reserve earned him the Reserve Decoration (and bar). No. 7 Buckingham Place is part of a group of terraced properties (no. 5 to no.19) which are listed Grade II and which date from about 1845.
Multinational advertising giant wants more of the pavement.
The world’s biggest outdoor advertising company JC Decaux has launched an appeal against our Council’s refusal to grant planning permission for a “Telecommunications Hub” on the pavement in Queen’s Road. The site is adjacent to the West Hill and North Laine conservation areas. The City Council have given two reasons for its refusal. Firstly, the inclusion of a large digital screen to one side and functional appearance on the reverse side featuring telephone, communication hub and defibrillator, would create additional street clutter and be an incongruous addition causing adverse harm to the visual amenity of the area. Secondly the proposal would be contrary to Brighton and Hove City Council’s Local Cycling and Walking Infrastructure Plan and highways policies by reducing the footway width and reducing the unobstructed/clear available footway capacity in an area that is considered very congested.
Some local residents have also objected to yet more digital advertising being thrust into our faces. I have considerable sympathy with this view having recently travelled on the top deck of a Brighton bus where I hoped to enjoy a view through the front window; only to be confronted by a digital screen flashing adverts at me instead!
Funny how you can think that because you’re good at one thing, that you might be good at another, only to find that you’re crashingly hopeless. I’m a good pool player, for example, but my golf game is dire, despite me assuming that balls in holes is balls in holes. With golf I have the odd amazing shot, but generally I’m slicing balls into forests and throwing my clubs in the water. But with pool, I’ve actually been warned off a winner-stays-on pub marathon in Scotland. “Ye better no win the next one,” cautioned an auld fella. I hadn’t even realised there were disgruntled Scottish heavies lined up scowling at the English bird who was making them all look silly. Anyway, I digress, sort of.
I’m a crack shot at clays – genuinely, I hardly miss a single one – and I love shooting. So I just assumed I’d be really good at axe throwing. Yeah, I said axe throwing, and yeah, I was absolutely dreadful. I took the Silver team there for our summer do. Thankfully we had cocktails afterwards, not before. And some of us were terrible, and some were just brilliant. I would say I was just below ‘Astoundingly awful.’ (Don’t even think about it, Lezard. A “Team outing” here is half a shandy and a bag of cheese’n’onions at The Eddy).
Despite the best efforts of the lovely Viking (Ben from Newcastle, resplendent with red beard and long hair and huge muscles who was coaching us), I was, on the whole, really a bit rubbish at axe throwing. A bit like golf, actually, I got the odd one in. And it’s very satisfying when the blade THUNKS into the wood. But mostly I watched, helpless, as the axe went rogue, splintering things and smashing into everything except the target. I tried not to get annoyed.
Ellie the intern, who is as slim as an actual blade and frankly looks like a good gust of wind would take her out, was thudding the axes into the board every single time. And burying them deep, further supporting the assumption that it’s all in the wrist. I watched her, wondering what she was doing and trying to emulate her relaxed flick, but to no avail.
The only moment of actual glory I had during the whole escapade was when I landed two axes at once in the same board (on purpose). There is video footage of me capering about and yelling in disbelief. But apart from that, axes were largely not doing what I wanted. It was, however, enormous fun and I would recommend it to anyone. Hatchet Harry’s is at the bottom of Dyke Road, and well worth a visit.
Sam is founder and Editor-in-Chief of Silver Magazine – for the mature maverick. www.silvermagazine.co.uk
It’s 10 o’ clock on a summer Friday morning at the Gardener Café. Mick is carrying a box of red peppers down to the kitchen where vats of black beans and quinoa are bubbling. Sarah is making pastry for scones, sweet and savoury, cartons of yellow label strawberries, just on the turn, piled behind her ready for Karen Lloyd to reduce them into an accompanying jam. Elodie is chopping pretty pink radishes, and the air is fresh with camaraderie.
This is the Real Junk Food Project’s central Brighton kitchen, bang in Gardener Street in the middle of the North Laine’s most vibrant shopping and café area. Mick and Sarah are volunteers, Karen and Elodie just two of the few paid staff, and the red peppers, black beans, quinoa, flour and strawberries just part of a massive haul from the overnight supermarket waste run.
The Real Junk Food Project, whose mantra is “feed bellies not bins” was created by Adam Smith in Leeds in 2013, and has since grown into a national and international movement of cafes, projects and pop-ups with one core objective: To intercept food waste destined for land fill and use it to feed people who need it, on a ‘pay as you feel’ basis. With afterschool clubs at its sister café, The Fitzherbert Community Hub in Kemptown, and pay as you feel cafes at St Lukes Church, Hollingdean Community Centre and Bevendean Hub, it’s a busy operation.
“We have volunteers driving electric vans to supermarkets across the city picking up amazing food that would otherwise go to waste,” Karen told me. “We get cakes and breads, flour, dairy, all sorts of vegetables. A lot of it hasn’t even got the stickers on it. It’s just surplus. There’s literally nothing wrong with the food at all. But if it’s not collected that will just go into the bins and into landfill. It’s absolutely disgusting.”
Disgusting is the right word. “A quarter to a third of food produced globally, is wasted” says the RJFP website, “and yet, there’s estimated to be 795 million people who do not get enough to eat. In the UK, two million people are estimated to be malnourished, while the UK as a whole creates an estimated 15 million tonnes of food waste every year.” If waste was a country, according to the UN, it would be the third largest in the world.
But there’s not much time to chat about the politics this morning. Karen and her team are on a deadline. “Once it comes to our cafes, we chefs look at the food, decide on the menu, and get on with it”, says Karen. ‘We have three hours to get on with service.”
The black beans, which have been soaked overnight, are going to go into a chilli and the Buddha bowls. The quinoa will become a tabouleh, while the pumpkin seeds have been roasted with a little bit of tamari. The mung beans have also been soaking to encourage them to sprout and will be added to the Buddha bowls.
In the walk-in fridge, massive Kilner jars of fermented celeriac, sauerkraut, kimchis and jams line the shelves. Herbs, tomatoes, lettuces, courgettes and cucumbers – often organic and donated from personal allotments, local farmers and Infinity Foods, but most of which have come in on the supermarket run in the last 24 hours, are piled high in boxes, ready to be cooked up over the weekend.
By lunchtime, the tables outside are packed with students, families and homeless people, often sharing a long table. “It’s all pay-as-you-feel” says Karen, “so it gives everyone the chance to get a really good meal.” This is a place to have lunch with a friend, or strike up a conversation with someone with a whole new life view. You choose. “It does get people talking” says Karen, “and hopefully they talk about how good the food is. I think that’s what food does, doesn’t it?”
If people can afford it though, they try to encourage them to pay it forward. And with funding a perpetual problem on top of the cost of living crisis driving people to find food more cheaply, it’s hitting the tills at the Gardener Café hard. “We have a suggested donation of £6.50”, but most people are
giving £1 or £2 for a full meal.”
The daily lunch on Monday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday is just one part of what Karen and her team of volunteers cook up over the course of the week. “This Saturday, we’re doing a 60th birthday party for 100 people. We’re making canapes and Buddha bowls for them. When the clients come to see us, we’ll go through a basic menu and make them aware it can change. We did a canape event on Wednesday for Wired Sussex. They wanted to know what the menu was going to be, but I couldn’t give it to them until three hours before the event because the ingredients can change. But when we got there and they saw the food, they were amazed by it.”
It’s clear that this is much more than a cheffing job for Karen, whose signature red lipstick and bleach blonde quiff suggests an interesting back story. “I moved to Brighton five years ago after living in Spain for 15 years. My partner had died and I was trying to find work and get back into the catering. I did some voluntary work for Junk Food, and I found my family, basically. That’s what it felt like. So, it really helped me to find my feet again after a very sad time in my life.”
If you want to get involved with the Real Junk Food Project, go to its website for more information. Donate if you can, but the real fun is lunch in the sunshine with whoever sits next to you. Just remember to pay it forward.
Since writing this article we’ve learned that the Gardener Street cafe is to close. The Real Junk Food Project put out this statement:
“It is with great regret that the directors of @realjunkfoodbrighton have decided to discontinue their lease for the cafe on Gardner Street and, as a consequence, the Gardener will close on 25th September 2023. When we first signed up to take on a city-centre cafe using the pay-as-you-feel model, we knew there were going to be many challenges. We could not have foreseen the imminent Covid-19 pandemic, but we managed to weather the associated lockdowns and have continued to provide much needed meals to thousands in our community over the three years since.
Sadly, the current economic crisis is putting extra strain on the food industry and this, combined with soaring energy bills and ongoing building maintenance works, mean that the costs are just too heavy for us to keep the Gardener open. The latter is also taking its toll on our staff and volunteers in a way that is simply not sustainable. Whilst the doors of the Gardener are closing, the mission of The Real Junk Food Project continues and we are optimistic for the future. Our customers in Hollingdean Community Centre, St Luke’s Prestonville and the Fitzherbert Hub in Kemptown will still be able to benefit from pay-as-you-feel lunches created by our wonderful teams.
We hope that by unburdening ourselves from the financial liabilities of the Gardener, we will be able to focus precious resources and energy into our existing venues and commitments.
A massive thank you to all staff, volunteers and everyone who has been involved in our lovely cafe. And thank you Infinity Foods Co-operative for being a supportive landlord.
Flower pot? Flower? Get it? Oh, suit yourself. Gilly Smith talks to Jasmine, the new florist on the Dials
There’s a new florist on the Dials. After 27 years, local legend, Ian Graham hung up his pinking shears at Christmas and handed his business over to Shereen.
Locals will recognise Shereen Druose from her occasional stints at Jasmine Healthfood, Shop which her husband, Phooad, has been running for 17 years since the family moved to the UK from Syria. But it was the occasional stints at Ian’s that has led to something of an epiphany for this mother of three. “I’d been volunteering for Ian, helping him out, you know?” she tells me as she stores the end of Friday flowers at the back of her husband’s shop as Ian had done for so many years. “And then I started to become interested in the flowers, the colours, learning the Latin names and things like that.” So it seemed a no-brainer for Ian to ask Shereen if she’d like to buy his business when he decided after his cancer diagnosis to retire.
“I didn’t want to,” Shereen laughs. “I’m a mum of 17, 13 and 10-year-old kids and I didn’t want a big responsibility of running a business. And then there’s my language…” It was Phooad who spotted the opportunity, not just to build her confidence, but also to expand the Jasmine empire. He looked for help online and quickly found The Sussex Flower School, just half an hour down the road in East Hoathly, enrolled Shereen, and life quickly took a more fragrant turn.
Shereen is rapturous about Georgia Miles, director of the flower school, and who, in full disclosure, happens to be a close friend of The Whistler. We know how persuasive she can be, but for Shereen, her eight-week career course in floristry was a game-changer. “I was so worried because my English is not so good,” she says. “But Georgia was just so nice. She was so motivating and inspiring. She was practical but also warm, and I made so many friends. I kept apologising for my language, and she just …” She whisks her hand in the smiley dismissive way I recognise. “She’d say ‘oh you’ll be fine!’”
And she was. Over the eight weeks, she learned all that she needed to know to run a floristry business, from tax to waste to where to buy the best flowers. And there was tea and cake. Plenty of tea and cake. “I still ask her now for advice, and she’s so lovely.”
Six months in at Jasmine Florist, which she now runs with Nikki Vincent, and Shereen has got through Valentine’s Day and Mother’s Day and is still standing. She’s even managing the kids after-school clubs.
Her family are all still in Syria, most in Damascus and some in Latakia in the North. She says that although they’re safe now, the war has left a miserable economic situation.
Her story fills them with joy; “They follow me on Instagram!”, she says, beaming. And as she tells me how she’s able to send them money herself now, she wells up. “Even when I send them £100, it makes a lot of difference to them. So that’s really wonderful. Yeah.”
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