Patel Brothers

This is the best place to buy great quality spices for any kind of cooking at low, low prices compared to spice specialty stores or in the mainstream grocery store. You’ll find every kind of ingredient you need for Indian cooking, and it’s also a great place for dried beans and lentils.

Wow an Indian grocery!!! I was impressed that this existed in New York and even more surprised at how expansive and neat their selection of groceries were. I grew up having a bunch of Indian marts by my place, so I was happily delighted to see this place! They carried a variety of veggies, rice and grains, curries, and snacks. They even have a huge selection of the Parle-​G biscuits!!!

Today was my first time here and I really loved it. They have every Indian spice you can think of at reasonable prices. I will absolutely be back.

great variety of indian food here at very good prices. it’s hard enough to find indian food you can prepare at home from microwave meals to spices you can use to prepackaged foods (i love the round fried potato chips you can hook into your finger!) anywhere in new york city but this place has it. fairly easy to get to as well on the train.
what would make this store better? hire pretty young indian girls like air india does air hostesses (they don’t take ugly or older girls after age 25). have them wear bollywood style beautiful outfits. let them talk nice to us. that will bring more of us guys to shop here.

This medium sized Indian grocery store. Had a lot of interesting things to glance over. Most of the things I’ve seen at other Indian markets. Produce, rice and grains, frozen/​refrigerated naan, crackers and sweets. Best part? They sell Foco Coconut Juice! I bought a cold one for the bus ride back to Columbus: p

My Mrs. likes this store for all Indian products, although some of the vegetables are priced a little higher then other local markets. Big, bright, clean premises, newly renovated. Weekday evenings are the best time to shop here, although it’s still busy, but weekends it’s just too crowded for comfort. I always find a nearby parking spot, though a lap around the block is sometimes necessary. Public transportation is much more convenient, as it’s just 1.5 blocks to the 74^th Street bus terminal and 1 block to the 7, E, F, and IND local trains.

excellent selection
clean
very efficient operation

Recently renovated and now better than ever. Patel bros has fresh produce, and good prices. In the summer we go for boxes of mangos. Usually stocking up on pineapple, pears, eggplant and kale also. I’m not great yet at Indian cooking, but this place has an amazing assortment of spices and ingredients to help me get there. They have large refrigerator and frozen aisles, and huge tanks of oil also.

My go to place for healthy snacks and mango juice, a horrible drive though. Must dodge cars and finding parking is tough
They also don’t take amex

Comparatively large, well-​stocked Indian grocery store. The staff are very helpful, and seemed to be particularly ready to help my caucasian self select spices. (My pride requires me to note that, while this makes sense in general, I didn’t need it.) I restocked my pantry for relatively cheap, and the quality has been pretty good. I do want to note that the «seedless» tamarind cake/​paste thingy in fact contains seeds, to the sadness of my teeth. In all, though, I was thrilled to come here and hope to return.

Lots of selection here, usually come here weekly to do my grocery shopping. Prices are a bit on the high side but I guess that is expected for NY.

OCT’2015: Store has nearly doubled in size with the floor and ceiling renovated, but they stayed with the same warehouse style of painted plywood shelving. I can’t tell what was added yet, but at least it’s roomier, seems cleaner and is far better lit now with similar selection and prices.
I am a European who comes here semi annually to stock up on Tetley Tea, many house brand dry Beans, and imported Ghee. I noticed many nut buyers posting here, so allow me to add that I don’t buy dry fruit, nuts seeds or flours at Patels as I do not feel their packaging methods are airtight enough, and usually find fresher stock at cheaper prices in Costco, Aldi’s and Vitacost. House staff attempts to be helpful, but falls short with english only speakers as they are unable to articulate differences between similar products, and often mislead you to what aisle something is because they only pretend to understand your request.
common sense ethnic shopping advice: it’s a good idea to skim products on their website before you come — so you already know what to look out for. While this high turnover place has fresher stock than most hole in the wall Indian grocers, you should still keep your eye open for made on or good till use dates. I found some normally 2 year items with 2 months left, and many items with no date at all. Half the products are sold in 2 different price/​size points, so if you are not happy with the date on one version, look up and down the same shelf for an alternate size with a better date. oddly enough many domestic house brand items (packed in USA or CAN) cost more than central asian imports of similar quality due to the overseas strength of the US Dollar.
compared to large China/​Korea modern grocers — Patel is really a 3-​star place as it lacks the excellent produce, fresh meat and fish monger, fresh baked or fried goods, fresh in house made ethnic take home food, etc. — but you probably won’t find an Indian grocer better than this newly expanded Jackson Heights Patel in or around NYC. I’m being star generous here to applaud their recent improvements, but it’s regrettable that an ancient country with over a Billion people and dozens of distinct food districts cannot be proudly represented by a store like this in NYC even after such an ambitious expansion.
ProTip: when selecting any of their bargain 10oz $ 1 Swad boxed side dish packets, look for the word «spiced» in the flavor description for a moderate indian full flavor experience, as all the other varieties are boring and bland. these are all too soupy to be an actual side dish, but they work great as colorful saucy toppers on any starch, whether it be roots pasta rice or even as a fresh baked bread dipper.

What kind of stupid people work in this establishment. I came in to shop and was told I could not enter the store with a cup of coffee? What kind of fu**ING nonsense is that? Where am I supposed to put my coffee then? It’s not like I am shopping for clothes or jewelry that I might ruin them with my coffee. stupid idiots works here. I will no longer give them my money. I would rather shop in Apna Bazaar where they are not stupid about their service. And I will make sure to tell my associates the same.

I love coming here! It has everything you need to stock your pantry for what you need to make fantastic Indian food. I never get to stay around and browse too long since L is always in a rush to leave. They have so many spices; lots of frozen, packaged items, good selection that are all natural. I like that their products aren’t as processed, compared to regular supermarkets.
The prices here are def cheaper than what you’d find at your avg supermarket and you won’t find most of these items in any of those aisles.
Those bags of snacks.fantastic. Spicy, crunchy, full of flavor and healthier than your msg laden Doritos, Wise, Lays, etc chips.
If only I didn’t move away.

Great place.
Varieties of spices and ethnic food.
Went there to find Indian powder, but I was disappointed I couldn’t find Kapoor Kachli and Bringrajh.
Only thing that they had was Amal.
But rest of the store was great.

The best Indian grocery store in Jackson heights. Also the busiest. A bit pricier than its other two competitors but worth the quality and service.
Unfortunately they don’t carry many brands from other Indian importers but then you can’t have it all. Good people.

This is the brownie marketfor anyone from India to almost all is Asia. If you live in the outer borough and you really have no idea where to find the Mashla or the okra or the Indian utensils then just coffee to jackson heights and go straight here. It has everything and anything you may need. From all fresh vegetables to every frozen item such as pakora, daal roti, etc. Whatever spices you would like to make curry, biryani, puhlah, etc you will find it here.
Service here isn’t bad but it’s not the greatest. They do answer all questions but with recent renovations everyone pace seemed to increase by ten folds. Weekend would be the worst time for you to come here to do any sort shopping. That is when people from NJ and LI come to do their shopping. So expect a massive crowd and no where to move around for the woke tone shopping there. That being said their new renovations and upgrades allows them to put many more things but take away from the little space they already had. So definitely come early and know what you are looking for.
The surrounding area gives you another reason to come. This is what I call as Brown central so different varieties of Indian food as well growing areas of Tibetan, Nepali, etc creates a dining experience you will surely enjoy. If you want the Sari or Salwarkamis of any countries this is the place to get it.

Patel Brothers… what can I say? You’ve been the market of my life. From when I was but a mere kitten mewling about in Artesia, CA, to a roaring lion in graduate school in Chicago, and now here, in my current hood, you’ve been there. With all of your flours and masala. With all of your beauty cosmetics straight out of India. The cooking utensils! The rolling pins for making roti! All of the teas! The many varieties of rice! Lentils, so many lentils! The same snacks that people halfway across the world are chomping down right at this moment!
You can also find some Arab staples here, like pomegranate concentrate and tahini. Latin Americans can get their tamarind and chili peppers here. The good people of Thailand can get white turmeric. We, the children of Mother India, are a global people, come, shop with us.
NOTE: If you go during the weekend, be prepared for extremely long lines, tightly packed aisles… a lot of people come here, like half of India, plus the diaspora.

By the the BEST Indian grocery store ever. They have everything you could possibly want. When I was growing up in Jersey all we had was a little store the size of a deli. This is like Pathmark size. Well not quite but it’s pretty big. They even have prepackaged and frozen Indian meals some of which I have never even seen or heard of before. The spices are a fraction of what they cost at a regular supermarket. I’d say at least 50% less if not more. They also have all a various assortment of flavored teas (chai, ginger, cardamom) which taste like home. Everyone is helpful (albeit a little gruff sometimes). My only beef is that it’s in Jackson Heights! ARGH. So impossible and out of the way to get to.

Patel Brothers is a great place to stop by and shop for all your Indian household needs. Love that they have branches all over NY, Cali and other states as well. If you’re new to Indian grocery shopping then check out their frozen food isle section where they have a huge variety of frozen Indian food. I highly recommend buying some «Kawan Brand» frozen Parathas. Also, be sure to check out the section with all the shaan masalas which are amazing!!! They also tell you the ingredients and directions on the back of each box so that you can get started with your at home Indian cooking! Oh and you might also want to pick up some «Kulfi» (Indian ice cream) on your way out :).

When I came to this Indian supermarket for the first time about 5 years ago, I was just overwhelmed by this place’s exotic atmosphere. I felt like I was traveling in India. I remember I saw a lot of spices, but I didn’t know what is what at that time and I wasn’t able to appreciate at full.
It has been 5 years since then. I went to many Indian restaurants and use different spices. I think I feel much familiar with Indian food than before. This week I went back to Patel Brothers supermarket after 5 years. Now I can understand how great this place is! This place has variety of spices and flours made from different grains at reasonable price. Especially spices are cheap. In fact, their spices’ quantity is 3 times or more than that, and it costs less than half. Recently, I wanted to buy Garam Masala and found it in American super market. I was $ 6 and expensive while other spices cost only about $ 3. Although I don’t use Garam Masala very often, I felt it ridiculous to pay a lot of money for a little amount of spice. So I checked Petal Brothers and found Garam Masala. It was in a plastic bag and less than $ 2, and the quantity was about 3 times more than the one in a bottle which I saw in American supermarket.
I needed Garam Masala to make Tandoori Chicken, but I saw Tandoori Chicken marinate sauce in a jar (only $ 2.99), too. So you don’t need to buy all spices to make Tandoori Chicken if you buy this sauce. This is very convenient. Also, I saw so many foods I have seen in Indian restaurant in a frozen section and an instant food section. So you can eat authentic Indian food at home. Isn’t it amazing? Especially, I thought instant food section is amazing. They have spice mixes and flour mixes to make curry, dosa… you name it. You just need to prepare vegetables or yogurt or something you can get easily and cook with the mix.
Their selection of vegetable is exotic for example, bitter melon. Have you tried bitter melons? It is bitter, but full of vitamin C. (To my knowledge, Indian people and Japanese people eat bitter melon. In Japan, especially it is popular among Okinawan people.) I noticed some vegetables and herbs are cheaper than American supermarket. I went there around 7pm, and it was crowded and hard to walk. So it is better avoid this time of the day. This supermarket is only less than a block away from Jackson Heights –Roosevelt Ave station.