Friends & Farms just opened two new pick-up locations in Baltimore city

An organization that offers food baskets sourced from regional farms is opening pick-up locations at a pair of Baltimore city locations.
Friends & Farms, which gathers a weekly bounty from a network of farmers and food producers from the mid-Atlantic, is opening pick-up locations in Canton and on the Johns Hopkins University medical campus in East Baltimore.
Add that to an already-existing pickup location in Federal Hill, and the organization also now happens to be well-positioned around some of Baltimore’s tech hubs.
“It is affordable,” said Friends & Farms’ Collin Morstein. “It keeps you out of the grocery store, and it keeps you from buying junk.”
We stopped by the first go-round at Canton Waterfront Park on Wednesday night, where Morstein was handing out baskets from Friends & Farms’ refrigerated truck. He showed us the variety of offerings in this week’s basket, which included a whole chicken from Locust Point Farms, andouille sausage and produce, like tomatoes from Hummingbird Farms and heirloom squash from Baywater Greens. Morstein said Friends & Farms also offers fresh fish.
On Thursday night, the refrigerated truck will be parked outside the newly-opened Atwater’s on Johns Hopkins’ medical campus. The location is right next to the FastForward East incubator in the Rangos Building.
Morstein said the truck came back empty after unloading about 40 baskets at a pop-up held at the East Baltimore location a couple of weeks ago.
“We did not have any delusions of selling out that event, and we did,” Morstein said.
The area is also a food desert, and Morstein said the organization is working on reaching out to the East Baltimore community beyond Hopkins.
Here are Friends & Farms’ pickup locations in Baltimore City:

• Canton Waterfront Park (3001 Boston St.), Wednesdays, 6:30-8:00 p.m.
• Atwater’s, Johns Hopkins (855 N. Wolfe St.), Thursdays, 4:30-6:00 p.m.
• CrossFit Federal Hill (1220 Key Highway), Thursdays, 7:00-8:30 p.m.
• The Gilman School (5407 Roland Ave.), Saturdays, 9:00-11:00 a.m.

The organization also has pickup locations in many Maryland suburbs. Check out the full list here.