Unpretentious and always friendly

Fish and chips - lovely!
Photo by Pete Reynolds, 1999

Bardsley’s in Baker Street is one of those local places that you stumble upon, then treasure. Unpretentious, always friendly, they serve up the best fish & chips in town. Definitely.

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  • I love this chip shop. My family owns it and my nan works in there. Oh lovely chips!

    By Chloe Matheson (25/04/2006)
  • I remember Bardsley’s in Baker Street, when I used to work in a butcher shop in the same street. The best fish and chips in Brighton! They also (I think I remember correctly) had a shop round the corner from Sydney Street, where I again worked in a butcher shop. Because we didn’t close for lunch we often used to get some piping hot good food to keep us going. Now, I’m going back to my very young days when Mum, Dad and I used to go to the cinema called the Academy in West Street. When we came out at the end of the films we used to go to a fish restaraunt in Russell Street. I do believe that that was part of Bardsley’s (please correct me if I’m wrong). Great memories of great British food!!

    By Brian Hussey (22/10/2006)
  • Bardsley’s has moved around I think. I remember it being on Upper North Street just west of Regent Hill. The one near the Academy may well have been a Bardsley’s too but I think it was in a small road just to the north of Russell Street and not in Russell Street itself (the small lane lead up to some derelict land that became Churchill Square). Great fish and chips wherever it is.

    By Adrian Baron (23/01/2007)
  • Far too expensive but the new chairs and tables have to be paid for somehow

    By David (08/03/2007)
  • The bill here is always a small price to pay for the best fish ‘n chips in Sussex, if not the whole of the south of England.

    By Alan Phillips (22/03/2007)
  • I don’t think Bardsley’s is expensive for what it is – simply the best fish and chips ever! We only live two minutes round the corner and have totally lucked out living so close!

    By Melanie (09/04/2007)
  • Bardsley’s fish and chip shop was in Upper Russell Street just around the corner from Regency Road. They also had one in Gloucester Road just up from Sydney Street on the right hand side.

    By Viv Webb (11/06/2007)
  • I love Bardsleys!

    By Olivia Eden-Brown (19/03/2008)
  • I’ve never tasted such yummy, not that fattening chips! The staff are friendly and are always helpful and understanding. They are my family – yay!

    By Cleo (10/06/2008)
  • Yes there was a branch of Bardsleys in Upper North Street.  I used to live in that part of Brighton and remember it well.

    By Edward Castle-Herbert (20/06/2008)
  • If you log on to the Regencysociety-jamesgray collecton,volume 29 image 135, there is a picture of their shop in Upper Russel St. The double fronted one.

    By Viv Webb (10/08/2008)
  • Bardsley’s now charges five pounds for corkage. For take-out it’s still good. Otherwise it’s now sadly like all the other restaurants.

    By Jeremy (07/11/2008)
  • Simply the best fish and chips in the whole UK. Very lovely friendly people who look after your every need. I may be a bit biased as I’m family but live along way away.

    By Victoria Muir (24/11/2008)
  • There were a number of Bardsleys and the Baker Street one is the only one left. They were all owned by my great grandparents – Benjamin Bardsley and his wife Annie – and their children – Jim, Emily, Isobel and Harriet. (Harriet and her husband William – Curly – ran the Baker Street shop and their family run it now.) My grandmother (Mary-Jane) ran a chip shop at the top of Edward Street called Moorhouses after her husband Tom, but the others were all called Bardsleys. Benjamin’s portrait hangs outside the Baker Street shop. Apologies to rest of the family if I’ve got some of these details wrong! And they are definitely the best chips ever!

    By Natalie Moorhouse (21/08/2009)
  • My stepfather, Donald Young, was in the shop opposite Bardsleys in the 1970s. It was called Soundtracks. Donald use to do the TV and Radio repairs mostly and Tony White and his wife did the business side. There was a young girl Barbara who sold the records and I also remember someone called George. The shop later became Rottingdean Tele Radios, I think.

    By Nina Blount (30/11/2009)
  • During the seventies, Bardsley’s of Baker Street sold the best tasting fish and chips in Brighton – in fact I remember thinking I had never tasted better, anywhere. Sometime, late seventies, I think, Bardsleys received an Egon Ronay Award – yes, a fish and chip shop. Soon after that, it was sold, and, though it may have been my imagination, there was a period during which the food just did not taste the same.

    By Joe Reid (07/01/2010)
  • I am now 6′, in 1959 I was 4’6″. How do I know? ‘cos I’m guessing that that was the height of the counter at Upper Russell Street and I couldn’t see over it. However, Harriet or one of her family would take out a chip and place it on the edge of the counter for me. I still have the scar on the top of my mouth, but I have still yet to sample a tastier chip!

    By Tony Hagon (11/08/2011)
  • Bardsleys in Baker Street now- it sounds like a cliche but I used to be sent by my parents on a Friday night with a ten bob note to fetch fish and chips for all our family (6 of us,) pickled onions and all. I’d get chips while waiting and a free bag of bits and still go home with change and they were the best f ‘n’ c in Brighton then and were just as good in Upper North St. Let’s hope the family keeps it going- a true Brighton tradition. 

    By Alan Taylor (13/09/2012)
  • Being a pupil at Middle Street in the 1940’s and early 50’s I passed the original Bardsley’s nearly every day. Peter Shiner who was related to them, and his mum worked in the shop.He was in my class at Middle St. This wonderful establishment was second to none and I lost count of the many bags of chips that I had. They were in 3 sized bags at 2d,3d, and 4d which was a feast. When the area was demolished I lost track of Bardsley’s and only recently have rediscovered them in Baker Street.

    By Peter Guy (21/05/2013)
  • Wasn’t there a Bardsleys chippy at the bottom of New England Hill?  I’m sure I remember the name. Anyway, that chippy (Bardsleys or not) was the first in Brighton to sell crinkle cut/curly chips!! In the early 60s me and a couple of pals in Patcham occasionally used to ride our ten or fifteen quid motorbikes out to the Shepherd and Dog at Fulking early’ish on a Saturday evening, have half a pint of Brickwoods (or was it Tamplins?) and then return home via Bardsleys for a bag of chips.

    By Neville Bolding (14/01/2018)
  • The chippie at the bottom of new England Road was Bostocks – they were serving crinkly chips in the 50s. 

    By Terry Hyde (15/01/2018)
  • Just up the road and on the opposite side of New England Rd was Rolf’s fish & chip shop.

    By Geoffrey Mead (16/01/2018)
  • Does any one remember Chris’s Fish and Chip shop in Edward Street on the left side going down just before High Street? I know it was a long time ago as we always went there during the war – fish and chips in newspaper always had that  added flavour, probably something from the ink.

    By Ken Ross (16/01/2018)
  • Ahh fish and chip shops, gives me  a warm cosy feeling, always after swimming training we would have a bag of chips, one at the bottom of North Road, another in Queens Park Road after winter training at St Luke’s, another good one in Hollingdean Terrace by the Roedale Pub! One of the best was in Baker Street by the Level, the owner was an older guy who used to train at Manors Gym, we used to call him ” Pic “!

    By peter paolella (17/01/2018)
  • Yes I remember Chris’ Fish & Chip shop. I was very young but it was one of Dad’s favourites so we went there often and I can remember sitting in there with our food and a big plate of bread & butter and pickled onions to go with it. Dad always used to like their skate or cod roe. He was a cabbie and I think it was very popular with the cab trade.

    By Rob(Bob) Tasker (17/01/2018)
  • I have many happy memories of the Bardsley’s fish n chip shop on Upper North Street. I grew up on this street, and as a small child in the 70’s, I would queue up on a Friday evening – and boy was that queue long back then (Friday’s were fish day and tradition!), and everything to little me was supersized, including the gherkins. There was a kindly woman who’d wrap a chip up in paper and offer me one with the warmest smile. I think she was one of the daughters of the Bardsley family. She did it every time with that unforgettable cheeky twinkle in her eye. What made Bardsley’s so great was the fact it was family run. I could taste the love in every bite of their sumptuous cod and exquisite crispy chips. I left home at 17, so I don’t know when or why they closed? I was sad when it did. It became an Indian takeaway afterwards for a short while…I’m glad to hear though that their shop on Baker Street is still going strong with the original family running it. Happy days! They don’t make them like Bardsley’s anymore… trick to a good fish n chips – clean oil and a lot of love! I bet that’s Bardsley’s secret!

    By Carey (23/08/2021)

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