Merritt Dworkin is known around Baltimore as the “market queen” — though she’s more likely to refer to herself as “the crazy market person.”
Whatever the title, Dworkin is the force behind some of the city’s beloved neighborhood farmers’ markets, including the Saturday morning Fells Point Farmers Market, and the Cross Street Farmers Market, held every Sunday from May to October.
“Markets are growing like crazy in the state of Maryland,” she told me recently, as another market season begins. Baltimore residents have a wealth of options, with 10 farmers’ markets within city limits and another dozen in neighboring Baltimore County, according to a 2023 guide published by the state’s Department of Agriculture.
This spring, Dworkin added another option to the list. Lunch Market at 873, a brand-new market near the University of Maryland BioPark, serves prepared foods, fresh flowers and coffee on Wednesdays from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m.
So far, Dworkin has recruited 26 vendors to set up shop on an empty lot at the corner of West Baltimore and Poppleton streets. She’s hopeful she’ll convince many more to join. For inspiration, she looks to the Fells Point Farmers Market, which had just 10 vendors when she started it in 2011. These days, the market features 70 vendors and serves as many as 4,000 people when the weather is nice. It’s also been a launchpad for businesses — notably Ekiben, which got its start as a market stall nearly a decade ago.
The Southwest Baltimore community surrounding Lunch Market at 873 doesn’t have many restaurant or fresh produce options: Nearby Hollins Market is closed for renovations for the next six months, and the closest supermarkets are at least a 20-minute walk away.
“It’s a food desert over there,” Dworkin said. “My goal is to just keep adding a variety of these vendors.”
So far, the market counts stalls from DMV Empanadas, Sparkplug Coffee, Soul Smoked BBQ, Panorama Bakery, MoreLife Organic Juices, Flickerwood Microgreens and Emmanuella’s Cuisine, which serves Haitian food, among others. Neopol Savory Smokery, which has a brick-and-mortar shop just a few blocks away, is another market participant and sold so much seafood salad on a recent Wednesday, Dworkin said, that owners had to replenish their supply four times.
The weekly lunch market is scheduled to run at least through October, and Dworkin said she’s open to extending its run if there’s enough demand. Her goal is to recruit at least 40 vendors — especially some fresh produce sellers — before the end of the season.
“More and more vendors are getting wind of it and wanting to be a part of it,” she said. “We tried to make it so there’s something for everyone.”
Lane Harlan’s new bar
Fans of Clavel, W.C. Harlan and Fadensonnen know by now that owner Lane Harlan puts as much careful planning into the setting at her bars and restaurants as she does the menu and the cocktail list.
Harlan’s new bar in Mount Vernon finds the restaurateur channeling the islands where she and her husband and business partner, Matthew Pierce, spent their childhoods. The Coral Wig, which opened May 25, is a lush and low-lit tropical hideaway, with mahogany walls, velvet banquettes and cocktails featuring tangy tamarind, overripe pineapple, guava nectar and coconut cream.
By email, Harlan told me that the drinks-only bar — tucked in the alley of the Hotel Ulysses, but not a part of the hotel — is inspired by the officer’s clubs of the Philippines, where she was born, as well as the beaches of St. Kitts, where Pierce, the son of missionaries, lived as a child.
The décor, designed with Joy Strom of Strom Interiors, incorporates work from friends and local artisans, from the hand-painted coral-and-yellow checkered floors inspired by New Orleans-based artist Andrew LaMar Hopkins (a former neighbor of Pierce’s in Mount Vernon), to a black walnut bar built by local craftsman Nick Petr and amber stained glass windows made by Tage Jakobsen of Artisan Glass Works in Hampden. There are vintage touches, too, like a marble cocktail table and 1980s-era Murano glass leaf pendant lamps.
What about the curious name? Harlan told me “The Coral Wig” was a piece of music Pierce wrote based on an experience the couple had snorkeling in the Caribbean. “…A school of squid stopped in front of Lane and remained suspended for some time,” she wrote. “Lane’s hair was long and floating all around her… like a coral wig.”
The Coral Wig is open Monday through Wednesday from 5 p.m. to midnight and Thursday through Saturday from 5 p.m. to 1 a.m. Happy hour — which offers $9 daiquiris, half-priced bottles of Champagne and $2 off wine, beer and estate martinis — is Monday to Friday from 5 p.m. to 7 p.m.
Good luck getting a seat. The intimate bar has seating for 35 inside, as well as a few small outdoor tables. When I stopped by on opening night, it was packed with visitors eager to get a taste of Harlan’s latest experience.
The butcher shop at JBGB’s unveils a new focus: lunch
In April, JBGB’s announced some changes were on the way, but the Remington restaurant and butchery was vague on the specifics.
The butcher shop’s new chapter is finally here. On May 23, JBGB’s launched a lunch and sandwich concept called The Butcher and the ‘Wich that the restaurant’s executive chef says is aimed at meeting the neighborhood’s needs.
JBGB’s, the restaurant and bar specializing in wood-fired pizzas, will remain the same. It’s the neighboring whole-animal butchery that is carving out a new path.
Inspired by John Brown General & Butchery, a sister business on Falls Road, The Butcher and the ‘Wich now serves a rotating array of specials, hot and cold salads and a menu of sandwiches, including a ham-and-cheese with housemade pickles and aioli, a double smashburger and an Italian beef combo with cured beef chuck, provolone, giardiniera and garlic Parmesan aioli. If you’re looking for something sweet, the shop also sells vanilla and chocolate soft-serve.
Fans of JBGB’s whole-animal butcher’s counter will still be able to order fresh cuts of locally sourced beef, pork and chicken, as well as dry-aged steaks and custom cuts, according to a news release.
“It’s been two incredible, and at times challenging, years in Remington, and this next evolution of our concept is about continuing to serve the neighborhood and entire city through expanding our popular lunch program,” Tyler Johnson, the executive chef at JBGB’s, said in a statement. “The support for our butchered items, pizza, and bar program have been incredible, and we can’t wait to give folks another reason to love JBGB’s.”
Pitango signs its first franchisees
Here’s a scoop: Pitango Gelato is now franchising.
The Baltimore-based bakery, cafe and gelato shop recently signed its first franchise agreement for a store in Northern Virginia. Franchisees Sam and Semy Lee are longtime customers of the Pitango shop in Reston, Virginia, and are looking to open their own store in the next 18 months, CEO Dinah Bengur told me this week.
The company, which operates five gelato and coffee shops in Maryland, Virginia and Washington, D.C. as well as the flagship bakery and cafe on the water in Fells Point, first announced its franchising plans in 2020. The pandemic slowed the process, though Bengur said Pitango has fielded interest from several prospective operators in neighboring states and is in talks to sign more franchise agreements.
Franchise locations will serve the same gelato, made from scratch at Pitango’s production plant in Glen Arm, as well as baked goods from the Fells Point bakery and coffee sourced from Vigilante Coffee in Hyattsville.
Bengur said the goal is to make Pitango, founded by Noah Dan in 2007, into a nationwide name.
“We’re excited to spread Pitango to as many people as we possibly can,” she said.
