The Independent Edition

CocoMango Farmers Market Owner: unknown Opened:  2019-2020 Cooperative:  none Location:  276 George St, New Brunswick, NJ Photographed:  July 2020 Our last New Brunswick stop is this very small greengrocer shop across the street from today's Bravo ! It sadly seems to have permanently closed, and it had a rather short life of just about a year. I'm sad that the store didn't survive, but I am glad to have photographed it while in business. If only I had gone inside. That's all for the New Brunswick area, come back tomorrow for our next group!

Latino Supermarket Owner: unknown Opened:  ca. 2012 Cooperative:  Krasdale Location:  132 French St, New Brunswick, NJ Photographed:  July 2020 Whenever I see a small grocery store like this one, I am always intrigued. I might have started by writing about the large supermarkets, but as you can probably tell from some of my latest coverage we're seeing more and more of the local grocery shops. That's partially just because I find them interesting and feel like visiting them, but also partially because I feel like I should recognize a lot of these independent store owners working very hard and putting everything they have into their friendly neighborhood grocer. Latino Supermarket, our third stop on French Street (see the first here and the second here ) is a good example of that. We enter on the left side of the approximately 4000 square foot store to produce and meat in the first room. Grocery/dairy/frozen and the register and exit are in the second room to the ri...

New Brunswick Farmers Market Owner: Jin Kin Opened:  1992 Cooperative:  none Location:  139 French St, New Brunswick, NJ Photographed:  July 2020 Don't let the still-under-renovation exterior of this 5900 square foot store fool you -- the interior is wonderfully classic. As we'll see, there's also a deceptively large selection in this small space. ( Here's a look at how the storefront previously appeared.) Much of the space is devoted to fresh produce, displayed mostly out on these cardboard boxes. Refrigerated produce cases on the right side, with a large seafood department in the back right corner (which seems pretty new). What's not new is the pressed tin ceiling and the wood paneling on the back wall, where there's a small deli as well. A few short aisles of groceries are on the far left side. There's a small open-air office in the front where the owners (I believe a husband and wife team) seem to do most of their work. The tiny office is on the other ...

La Placita Mini Market Owner: unknown Opened:  unknown Cooperative:  none Location:  148 French St, New Brunswick, NJ Photographed:  July 2020 We are starting with downtown New Brunswick with this small grocery store at the west side of the downtown area, with French Street (which this store is on) being one of the main thoroughfares through. We're a few blocks west of the Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital, affiliated with Rutgers University which has a few campuses in the area -- the main one being just under half a mile to the north. Sadly I know very little about this particular grocery store and am mostly unable to find information about it online, so I can't say too much about it other than, in light of that, I regret not going in. Make sure to check out today's other post, which is just diagonally across French Street, here ! Tomorrow we have two more posts to the east, one here on The Independent Edition and one over on The Market Report .

Garden Farm Market Owner: Ki Chung Opened:  1997 Cooperative:  none Location:  2545 US-1, North Brunswick, NJ Photographed:  February 2021 This 13,000 square foot arched-roof building (probably a former skating rink) is today home to the Garden Farm Market in North Brunswick. Up until 2011, this space was occupied by a store called the Garden State Farmers Market, being taken over that year by the owners -- I think -- of the Garden Farm Market in Metuchen and others. An extensive remodel in 2017 eliminated the signature orange and green exterior and replaced it with this much more modern, sleeker beige and red color scheme. Although this side faces the highway, the front wall of the store runs along the side of the building. The entrance and exit are in the back corner, since most of the parking is in the rear. You enter in the back right corner with produce in the back half of the store. Frozen is on the left side wall. The front half has deli and seafood on the f...

  Our next group of stores as we circle back north is in the greater New Brunswick area! We'll be starting at the south end of the group, with South River, Milltown, and North Brunswick, then passing through the eastern edge of Somerset, the next town to the west, before ending in downtown New Brunswick, which is geographically in the northeastern corner of the municipality, before we cross the Raritan River again to return to the northern part of Middlesex County in our next group. But for now, we're starting with a small store on The Market Report tomorrow and a former supermarket across the street on  Grocery Archaeology !