Robin Godwin: Milk & Honey Market by Vagrant Coffee Opens in Pigtown

Milk & Honey Market by Vagrant Coffee opened last week at 906 Washington Blvd. in Pigtown. The 1,700 sq. ft. cafe is part of the Bath House Square development by SAA/EVI.

This new Pigtown cafe is the third location for Vagrant Coffee which also operates a Milk & Honey Market in Station North and 3 Bean Coffee in Federal Hill, which will change its sign to Vagrant Coffee in the next couple of weeks. Vagrant Coffee co-owner Josh Dew told SouthBMore.com the new Pigtown location has been an immediate success and has outperformed the other two cafes in its first week open.

Milk & Honey Market’s Pigtown location is in a former Baltimore City Fire Station. It has 14 ft. ceilings, exposed brick walls, a concrete floor, and a glass garage door on the front facade that opens up to Washington Blvd. The cafe features string lighting and furniture from the former Penn & Quill in Station North. Vagrant Coffee co-owner Jared Cate’s motorcycle is also a design piece in the cafe.

Vagrant Coffee roasts its own beans at another coffee shop in Canton, but is currently under construction to build a roaster in Station North/Greenmount West. Dew says Vagrant sources its beans from all over the world and looks to create a medium blend.

Milk & Honey Market serves drip coffee drinks and lattes, along with nitro cold brew, kombucha from Baltimore’s Wild Kombucha, smoothies, and tea from Baltimore’s Wight Tea Company. The food menu is the same at all three cafes and features croissants, banana bread, yogurt and granola, croissant breakfast sandwiches, smoked salmon on a bagel, and avocado and hummus on toast. Lunch sandwiches include ham and cheese as well as turkey, apple, and brie. It also offers a Caesar salad and a cobb salad.

Milk & Honey Market sells take-home bags of coffee and 32oz bottles of iced coffee.

Milk & Honey Market is open Monday to Friday from 7am to 5pm and Saturday and Sunday from 8am t0 6pm. Dew said they may be interested in adding dinner hours in the future and have interest in acquiring a liquor license. He said they are also interested in adding live music for weekend brunch.

Milk & Honey Market was first proposed four years ago, and Vagrant Coffee got involved in the project in January. Dew and Cate were hoping to open in June, but COVID-19-related delays pushed it back to September.

Dew said the neighborhood has given Milk & Honey Market’s a “very warm welcome” so far. He said many of the other businesses owners have come by and they’ve had many customers from Pigtown, as well as from neighboring communities of Barre Circle, Hollins Market, and Ridgely’s Delight.

Vagrant Coffee started as a traveling pop-up and catering coffee business in 2017. Dew and Cate met when they both worked at Ceremony Coffee Roasters and decided to team up after learning that a lot of people were requesting baristas for special events. They started a mobile cafe out of a Mini Cooper and started attending events and farmers markets. The mobile cafe remains an important part of their business as they have added brick-and-mortar locations.

Vagrant Coffee’s beans have also been distributed to different coffee shops around the country including a recent three-month rotation at a shop in Seattle, a city well known for its coffee industry.

Dew and Cate have formed a great partnership with SAA/EVI principal Ernst Valery who started the Milk & Honey brand with his wife Dane Valery before Vagrant Coffee took it over. They are opening Vagrant Coffee locations at two of Valery’s developments in Philadelphia in West Philadelphia and Brewerytown.

Photo of Jared Cate and Josh Dew from Vagrant Coffee’s Facebook page