Pickled vegetables are having a moment—and local restaurants are paying attention to the culinary possibilities.

“They’re versatile,” says chef Robbie Tutlewski, owner of Little Donna’s in Upper Fells Point. “They make a showcase.”

The house pickle plate on Tutlewski’s menu is a prime example. Heaped with pickled baby carrots, watermelon rind, baby cucumbers, beets, and whatever else strikes the chef’s fancy, the dish is a satisfying palate pleaser, complete with creamy deviled eggs.

“Pickles are super [food],” says Tutlewski. “They’re good for you. I’ve been eating them from the time I was a kid.”

He’s not the only restaurateur who’s been devouring pickles since childhood.

“When I was a kid, I loved pickled beets,” says chef Jesse Sandlin. “My mom would send me to school with a jar of beets in my lunchbox.”

That food fondness stuck with the Baltimore-bred chef, who now features pickled vegetables on her menus, including “lunch-box beets” at Sally O’s in Highlandtown. At Bunny’s Buckets & Bubbles in Fells Point, she fashions a container of mixed tart veggies with bell peppers, carrots, and radishes.

“It’s a nice little appetizer because it doesn’t fill you up,” Sandlin explains. “It adds acid and gets your appetite going a bit.”

Chef Jeremy Hoffman, who operates Preserve in Annapolis, taps his childhood.

“One of my earliest memories is going to the grocery store to the deli section when they used to have big barrels of dill pickles,” he says. “I remember opening the lid and loving the scent. Everything is made better with pickles.”

Hoffman carried over that idea to Preserve, where “pickling, preserving, and fermenting is a passion.” His icebox pickles showcase cucumbers, carrots, red peppers, and onions. His house giardiniera is a jumble of cauliflower, olives, pickles, and peppers in an olive brine.

“Vinegar-based pickles lend themselves to be an accent to other dishes,” Hoffman says. “People’s flavor profiles and what they’re willing to eat has really expanded.”

On a late winter Monday, Jesse Sandlin enjoys a rare day off. Lately, she’s been trying to take more time for herself, which hasn’t exactly been easy now that she’s the owner of three restaurants. She readily admits that she thrives on chaos—still, at 45, after 30 years in hospitality, she knows it’s time to slow down.

“I’m getting older,” says Sandlin. “I can’t do it like I used to, but I feel so much guilt if I’m not working. There has to be a better way—I don’t want to die on the line at 55.”

But even in her off time, away from the commotion of her kitchens—Bunny’s Buckets & Bubbles in Fells Point, Sally O’s in Highlandtown, and The Dive in Canton—there’s still plenty to maintain in her East Baltimore home, where there’s more than one of just about everything (except for her).

There are cookbooks along with bric-a-brac—dozens of Buddha heads, a collection of of vintage Carnival glass, various pieces of taxidermy, as well as a jungle’s worth of tropical plants—some 200 hoya, philodendron, anthurium, and orchids hang in the windows and crowd into greenhouse cabinets in her living room and basement.

While she’s the only human in the house, she lives with a veritable Noah’s Ark of animals, including two English bulldogs, Dozer and Holly, who take up most of the real estate on her emerald-green living room sofa, and two 150-pound litter-box-trained Juliana pigs, Olli Speck and Dylan Fernet (aka Fernie), who occupy an upstairs bedroom and sleep on a queen-sized bed with an electric blanket. There’s also a cat named Ivey Magnolia, who lounges on her own bed in the basement.

In addition to tending to the plants and pets on her days off, Sandlin watches true crime shows and naps next to the bulldogs on the sofa, while a robotic Roomba roams the floor picking up pet hair. And while Sandlin’s version of slowing down would be anyone else’s idea of busy, she says it has taken a long time for her to even get to this more medium speed.

“At some point, years ago, someone asked me, ‘If you weren’t in restaurants, what would you do?’” she says. “And I was like, ‘I don’t know, I’ve been doing this for so long now.’”

Almost overnight, Jesse Sandlin became a household name when she appeared on Bravo’s Top Chef in 2009, though she was never seeking fame. She was only hoping to drum up publicity for Abacrombie Fine Foods, where she had her first post as executive chef.

Though the restaurant, just across the street from the Meyerhoff Symphony Hall in Mt. Vernon, had shown some promise with glowing early reviews, non-performance nights were empty.

“One time, I remember doing the dinner rush and hearing someone say, ‘We love the food here, we can’t wait to come back when we go to the next show in a month,’” recalls Sandlin. “And I thought to myself, ‘Do you know we’re open all the time for dinner? You don’t have to fucking limit yourself to coming at six o’clock on a Friday night!’”

So, when Top Chef’s Magical Elves production company came calling, the timing was fortuitous.

“They were looking for a strong female from the Baltimore area,” says Sandlin, “and they had already called Cindy Wolf [of Charleston] and asked her to do it. Of course, she was like, ‘No.’ But her director of operations said, ‘I think I have someone who would be really good.’”

That someone was a then-30-year-old Sandlin, who traveled to Philadelphia with an audition tape in hand to meet with casting directors.

“We made a little video of me making some scallops, riding my bike around Baltimore with friends, and drinking at the Club Charles,” she says. “I didn’t want to do it, but I thought it would help with business.”

After that, it was off to LA to meet the Top Chef producers—and in 2009, she was cast in the show’s sixth season.

The experience, however, was more bust than boom. Sandlin finished at the bottom of the first four episodes and was eliminated in episode four, over a one-bite amuse-bouche, then had to stick around for the duration of the show, which taped in Las Vegas in the blazing heat of summer. Her parting on-camera words during her exit interview? “The thing I want people to know is that I don’t suck this bad.”

To make matters worse, it did not end up giving a boost to her restaurant back in Baltimore. By the time the episodes aired, her dad was gravely ill. After his death, a grieving Sandlin took some time to herself, headed to Australia, and never went back to Abacrombie, which closed in 2007.

The sting from that part of her life still lingers. “I used to wish I had never done Top Chef,” says Sandlin, her eyes watering at the memory. “I had no idea of the mental toll that it would take, but the editing makes it look so great. You get there and you’re completely isolated. It’s just something I don’t talk about much. I learned that I was a terrible celebrity.”

While reality TV wasn’t where she shined, some 15 years—and a score of restaurant jobs—later, Sandlin has found her own sort of fame on a local level. It didn’t come overnight from a reality show—it has come the old-fashioned way, through a combination of grit, talent, and tenacity.

“I’m a survivor,” she says. “I’m going to do what I need to do to be okay.”

Back in Baltimore, thanks to her elevated comfort food and chef-driven corner bar fare, Sandlin has found her following and no longer needs to worry about filling seats—at Bunny’s, her latest venture, she serves 250 patrons at Sunday brunch. And Top Chef be damned, her food—both whimsical and delicious, from the pickle pizza at The Dive to her pink cornmeal hush puppies at Bunny’s—feels just right for quirky Baltimore, though her more classical items, like duck-leg confit and shrimp and grits, are equally impressive.

Now in middle age, with her pierced nose, food-themed tattoos (a stick of butter, a cheesesteak, a ham), and a propensity to drop an F-bomb into almost every utterance, Sandlin is completely—unapologetically and appealingly—herself. The chef is also refreshingly outspoken, as she weighs in on everything from the injustices of the ever-evasive James Beard Award for her many-times-nominated mentor, chef Cindy Wolf, to her struggles with her weight.

“I’m like, ‘Maybe I’ll lose weight, maybe I won’t.’ I am too old to fucking care anymore.” At the same time, she admits to being hard on herself.  “Maybe it’s something I have to visit with my therapist,” she says, “but I never feel good enough. I don’t know what that’s about.”

By the age of 10, Sandlin was a latchkey kid. Her single social worker mom spent long hours on the job, but money was tight.

“My mom was very thrifty,” she says, “and that came from growing up poor. On Saturdays, we would cut coupons and go to four different grocery stores.”

Typical family meals were roast chicken, Steak-umms, and Hamburger Helper. “My mom was a survivor,” Sandlin says. “There were times when she worked nights and weekends. And my dad was supposed to pay child support but he didn’t.”

Out of necessity, Sandlin learned to cook. “I’d make snickerdoodle cookies,” she says, laughing, “but it was nothing like on Master Chef Junior, where these kids are making foie gras.”

Eventually, her mom married, but family life was still strained and her stepfather was “mean and militant,” says Sandlin, who moved from Highlandtown to Dundalk to Essex and finally to Glen Burnie, where she attended high school.

In 1994, while still in high school, she landed her first job in hospitality. “I worked at a Discovery Zone, which is basically like a Chuck E. Cheese with ball pits and tunnels and they had a little area with pizza,” she says. “I was 16 and on acid. Eventually, I became the party captain in charge of the other party hostesses at kids’ birthday parties.”

From there, she took a job at Ann’s Dari-Creme, a long-running hot dog joint and something of an institution in Glen Burnie. She started as a dishwasher, before moving on to making hot dogs and taking orders.

“I learned to take orders without writing anything down,” she says. “It helped me in the long run,” she says. “You have to learn the system to remember things, which I’m really good at. That’s something that set me up to be a great line cook in the future.”

In the late ’90s, she headed to her mother’s home state of California, where she graduated from Sacramento State, then taught fifth and sixth graders in a private school. After a student ratted on her for having tattoos, she was fired from the job.

“I was like, ‘Why am I doing this? I hate mornings, I don’t like children, and I’m fucking miserable,’” she recounts. So, she went back to restaurant work. To make ends meet, she says, “For a long time, I worked two jobs—I’d work one from 8 to 3 then another from 3:30 to midnight.”

Her first high-end restaurant job was at Esquire Grill, a steakhouse in Sacramento. There, she learned to make gourmet ice cream and invented flavors like roasted banana walnut. “I’d ask the chef if he wanted to taste what I was making and he was like, ‘No, I totally trust you,’ and I was like, ‘Okay, I guess this is what I do now.’”

She was also indoctrinated into hard-driving kitchen culture.

“I was coming home when the streetlights were going off,” she says. “I was wild. We moved from daytime to nighttime and we’d all walk off the line together and sit down and have a beer, then we go to another bar together. On Thursday nights, we’d watch Dave Chapelle and go to work at 7 a.m., hungover and miserable, before Excedrin Migraine was even a thing.”

On a lark, in 2004, she traveled to Perth, Australia, and worked in a Mexican restaurant. “The food was terrible,” she says. “We served kangaroo tacos. We were so far away from Mexico, there was no authenticity whatsoever. I was like, where are the chile rellenos? Where’s the lengua?”

She lasted in the job only two weeks but stayed in Perth and worked in other local restaurants for six months or so. “It was an awesome experience but it was super isolated,” she says.

Missing her family back home, Baltimore beckoned and she was stateside again by 2005. As she headed home, she’d read about chef Cindy Wolf, co-owner/chef of Harbor East’s Charleston, in an issue of Gourmet magazine.

“I was like, ‘I’m going to move back to Baltimore and I’m going to work there,’” she says.

There were no openings at the time, but after interviewing with Wolf, she was offered a position as a line cook at Petit Louis Bistro in Roland Park, another property in the Foreman Wolf restaurant group. After a year, she made a quick jump to Spike Gjerde’s Vespa in Federal Hill, then got the call that there was an opening as a line cook at Charleston.

“I had never done food as high-end as Charleston,” she says. “And at Petit Louis, I learned those super classic French dishes. It was the first time I ever had duck confit. I learned a lot of discipline, even in how I carried myself in the kitchen, and also learned how to interact with servers just by watching that staff and the very formal brigade system.”

All the while she added to her culinary education, learning what it meant to have high standards. “As a line cook, I always knew that consistency is important but I really understood it when I went to work for Cindy Wolf, who believes that there’s no such thing as no time to do it right. It was going to be right or we were not going to serve it.”

From Charleston, she worked at Pazo, Foreman Wolf’s now-closed tapas restaurant in Harbor East. “We’d serve 1,200 people some nights. With the recommended three or four plates per person, that was almost 5,000 plates a night,” she says. “I’d come in at noon and leave at three in the morning. And on Sundays, I’d go to the farmers market with Tony Foreman at 6 a.m., still hungover after being up all night.”

From there, she was seemingly everywhere. Mt. Vernon’s Sotto Sopra, making pasta and pastry; briefly baking bread for B Bistro, Tapas Teatro, and The Helmand; and working as a line cook at Cinghiale in Harbor East. After that, she was executive chef at the Italian-leaning Vino Rosina in Harbor East, which begat an executive chef job at downhome barbecue joint Oliver Specks Eats & Drinks in the same space. Other stints followed at the corner bar Jack’s Bistro and Southern-style Jokers N’ Thieves in Canton.

Her food was innovative and elevated but the customers didn’t always care. “I was doing shrimp and grits and I made this blackened catfish with hominy and bacon and salsa verde that was fucking delicious,” says Sandlin of her time at Jack’s, “but nobody gave a shit—everyone wanted a burger.”

It was at The Outpost American Tavern in Riverside where she first found her voice in the kitchen.

“Until then, I was trying to do what I thought other people wanted,” she explains of her life as a peripatetic chef. “I started to cook food that I wanted to eat, so if there was a burger, it was a great burger, and it was on an onion roll because I love an onion roll when I eat a burger.”

Beyond burgers, there were other more chef-driven dishes, like shaved Brussels sprouts and blue cheese with candied pecans, house-made gourmet “trash can” nachos, and blackened tuna salad with pickled onions and carrots tossed in a sweet chile dressing.

In the summer of 2020, she opened her first restaurant on the site of The Laughing Pint in Highlandtown. After signing the lease for what became Sally O’s, she promptly had a meltdown.

“I sat in the pigs’ room and had a panic attack,” she recalls. She called her friend Brian Acquavella, who later became her business partner (along with Matt Akman) in the venture. “He talked me off the ledge,” she says. “He told me I’d be fine.”

And much like the style she started at The Outpost, the menu she devised was a high-low blend with something for every palate—and pocketbook.

“I wanted a true neighborhood place where you could stop in and drink a Natty Boh and eat a smashburger and wear your sweatpants,” says Sandlin, “or you could come in a nice suit and tie and get a great steak and a good bottle of wine or a cocktail. The idea was that everyone is welcome. We want you to feel comfortable and not judged—and that style of service is very Baltimore.”

Acquavella, who first met Sandlin when he owned Jokers & Thieves, has enjoyed watching her trajectory.

“Jesse started her career in the humblest place possible—cooking hot dogs—and she managed to make it into the kitchen of Foreman Wolf, the two greatest restaurateurs in Baltimore,” he points out. “She has such a broad range and is not afraid to use that. Most chefs find their lane and stay in it—Jesse has an eight-lane highway and moves side to side.”

On an unseasonably warm Wednesday afternoon, Sandlin sits in the upstairs dining room at Bunny’s, near the open kitchen. Years ago, a coworker dubbed Sandlin “Bunny,” after the sexy rabbit logo on the bag of Bunny-Luv brand carrots. She ran with it. There’s bunny artwork throughout the restaurant, which serves up serious eats with a wink. On a marquee over the U-shaped bar, there are cheeky slogans: “Some bunny luvs u” and “Nuggs & kisses.”

“You guys did a great job of selling the halibut dish last night,” says Sandlin during her menu meeting with staff. “We have five left. Now, who knows what the gnocchi prep is?”

As her cook thaws scores of biscuits and drops chicken in the Bunny’s pressure cooker behind her (they do 350 orders of fried chicken on a busy night), Sandlin sits front and center.

“We have 17 [parties] on the books tonight,” she says, “but it’s nice outside; don’t be surprised if you get a late-night rush.”

While she talks, her niece and Bunny’s staffer, Kaylee, affectionately puts her arm around her aunt—but everyone on staff is family. Once the meeting is over, Sandlin jokes with her staff about doing karaoke after work one night soon.

“Of course, I’ll do ‘Total Eclipse of the Heart,’” she says, “because it’s fucking awesome.”

After the meeting, Sandlin will organize her walk-in refrigerator, then head home to her menagerie, while Kaylee takes her place expediting during dinner service.

This is Sandlin setting boundaries and making more time for herself. She still enjoys nights out with her staff but she says, “I’m significantly less wild now, though I do go out and drink more than my rheumatologist would like.”

She’s come far since her early days, when money was the driving force.

“When I was working two jobs, it was just to make money,” says Sandlin. “I am happy for all the experience I got but I’d work myself to death as long as I could buy whatever I wanted—that comes from being poor as a kid. I still remember that when I was at the store with my mom, I always wanted a gumball from one of those machines on the way out and my mom would never give me a quarter for one. Now, if I see a gumball machine, I’m getting a gumball.”

Sandlin defines success differently now.

“I have employees who are happy and who really like working for me,” she says. “And I’m able to give people jobs and pay them a living fucking wage, and I’m able to treat people the way I wish people had treated me years ago.”

She’s proud of the fact that she recently treated a Bunny’s sous chef and his line cook girlfriend to a birthday meal at Marta. “I called ahead and told them to put the meal on my credit card,” she says. “I love that I could do that.”

Away from the cameras and out of the spotlight, Sandlin has redefined just what it means to be a top chef.

While not exactly a new trend, macaroni and cheese has stood the test of time ever since the first recipe found its way stateside in 1769, after Thomas Jefferson is said to have first tasted it in France. (In fact, he was so taken with the creamy combination of noodles and cheese, he later served it at a state dinner.)

First flourishing in the South, then making its way across every kiddie menu (and dorm room) in America, it’s been a comfort-food staple for all ages ever since. Perhaps its peak was in 1937, during the Great Depression when Kraft Foods introduced boxed macaroni and cheese, which cost 19 cents a meal and served four.

Since then, the dish has gotten an artsy upgrade, whether that means adding ingredients such as lobster, pulled pork, or truffle oil.

In Baltimore, the reigning queen of the popular dish is chef Jesse Sandlin, who features mac and cheese at all of her Baltimore City restaurants (Bunny’s Buckets & Bubbles, Sally O’s, and The Dive).

“It’s a super classic comfort food, and it’s also a blank canvas,” she says.

Through the years, Sandlin has topped her white mac and cheese with dried porcini breadcrumbs and her more classic Velveeta version with Sriracha Cheez-Its and bacon bits. Two current varieties are elbow noodles coated in Monterey jack, Parmesan, white cheddar, and Oaxaca cheese atop a smoked chicken breast at Sally O’s, and a bechamel-based version topped with Ritz crackers and panko toasted with brown butter and herbs at Bunny’s.

“I loved Stouffer’s frozen mac and cheese as a kid,” says Sandlin. “I was a latchkey kid, so I had a lot of boil-and-bag meals, stuff I could microwave and TV dinner-type stuff. I still have a love for it. It’s a very nostalgic food for me.”

Arguably, no one has more Highlandtown pride than chef Jesse Sandlin. A nearly decade-long resident of the historically blue-collar neighborhood—rife with local businesses, restaurants, and arts institutions—Sandlin jumped at the opportunity to take over the longtime home of The Laughing Pint on the corner of Gough and South Conkling streets after it closed in the fall of 2019. Although the previous watering hole was beloved by locals, Sandlin wanted to reinvent the corner bar so that it would appeal to community residents and visitors alike.

“When this space became available, I felt strongly about creating a place that the neighborhood would feel comfortable in and want to patronize,” Sandlin says. “But I also think there’s something about bringing other people, and hopefully other businesses, to this area so they can see how great it is. If it’s the same 30 people coming here all the time, then the neighborhood is never going to grow.”

That mission has continued to guide Sally O’s, the first spot Sandlin has owned and operated herself. In the year since its debut, diners have flocked from near and far to snag a velvet-upholstered seat in the vibrant space, filled with greenery, neon signage (“This Must Be the Place” hangs above the bar), and wallpaper designed by former MICA students.

Around every corner, you’ll spot knick-knacks—everything from a twirling disco ball to a Notorious B.I.G. prayer candle—that reflect Sandlin’s eclectic style.

“It’s all me,” she says. “With COVID there were so many setbacks. When it came time to actually get the space finished, it was like, ‘I have this vision, but mostly it’s a bunch of [stuff] that I like on the wall.’”

Other details—from the name (after Sandlin’s grandmother, Mildred O’Dethal, whose nick-name was “Sally O”) to the food (experimental takes on classic comfort foods)—are just as personal. The Top Chef alum uses local ingredients from Richfield Farm in Manchester to craft specials based on what’s in season, but you can also count on staples such as the fan-favorite Highlandtown Smashburger—two chuck, brisket, and short rib patties layered with American cheese and classic fixins.

“Eat your feelings,” our server, Peter, suggested on a recent visit. After starting with a smooth gin, honey, and lemon cocktail, we did just that. We snacked on birria-style carnitas tacos and beets tossed in vinaigrette and topped with whipped chèvre, before biting into a fried chicken sandwich elevated by pickled onions and spicy mayo. We also enjoyed Sandlin’s “Crabonara,” inspired by a family-meal dish Sandlin was served while working in California years ago. Her version ingeniously mixes blue crab with the pasta instead of pancetta. It arrived seasoned just so—with specks of thyme, heaps of Parmesan, and clumps of the sweet meat.

The dish serves as another example of how Sandlin shows off her love for her neighborhood—and her customers, no matter where they come from.

SALLY O’S, 3135 Gough St., 410-624-5631. HOURS: Mon.-Sat. 5-10 p.m., late-night menu until midnight. PRICES: Appetizers: $6-22; entrees: $14-40; desserts: $6-10.

ON WEEKEND MORNINGS beginning in August, mysterious long lines began to stretch around Canton Square. Those at the front entered a store with no sign above it. When they left, whether they were carrying chocolate babka, a Tamago Sando (a Japanese egg sandwich), or a simple cup of coffee, they seemed blissfully unbothered by the wait.

When Café Dear Leon opened, co-owner Min Kim had no idea what to expect. He and two partners had been discussing the concept since September 2019, and they took over the building in February. Then…well, you know what happened next.

“Initially, we were going to open sometime in May,” Kim says. “We figured since things were not going to be opening at the regular time, we were going to do some of the work on the building ourselves, which saved us money.

[Editor’s Note: After taking some time off, we are happy to resume our recurring “Open & Shut” column chronicling the latest restaurant happenings. Throughout the past few months, we’ve pivoted our weekly food coverage to tell personal stories of how chefs, restaurant owners, and industry workers are faring throughout the pandemic. Our “Without Reservation” column will continue, and as the food scene continues to press on in the wake of ever-changing dining regulations, “Open & Shut” will also run on a bi-weekly basis. We deeply appreciate your readership and hope that this column reiterates the importance of supporting Charm City’s unique array of restaurants, especially when they need it most.]

OPEN

NiHao: Perhaps the most highly anticipated local restaurant in years has officially made its debut in Canton. Culinary icon Peter Chang, along with his wife, Lisa, and daughter, Lydia, have brought on longtime friend Pichet Ong to collaborate on a menu of contemporary Chinese dishes that reflect both of the chef’s styles. Now open for carryout and delivery, NiHao—the casual Chinese greeting that evokes a sense of connection, according to the owners—offers traditional options such as a whole peking duck, shrimp dumplings, and mapo tofu. And enticing dishes unique to the restaurant include cumin lamb and corn ribs, chicken and tofu skin salad, Grand Marnier prawns in lettuce cups, and crispy bamboo catfish. Beverage director Janet Cam, formerly of Le Pavillon in Washington, D.C., has curated a list of worldly wines, Asian beers, Baiju cocktails, and craft sodas made with house-made shrubs to pair with the food. As they continue with their phased opening plan, the owners are looking forward to unveiling the revamped interior of the former Fork & Wrench space when the restaurant opens for indoor dining in the months ahead.

Lexington Market: Lexington is the latest of the Baltimore Public Markets to reopen in the midst of the coronavirus. Effective today, the market will open with proper safety measures at 50 percent capacity on Thursdays, Fridays, and Saturdays from 8 a.m.-4 p.m. As shoppers return to visit their favorite vendors, developers with Seawall continue their redevelopment plans and will soon begin the vendor selection process for the revamped market set to open in 2022.

Sally O’s: Diners got a taste of this new concept from Top Chef alum Jesse Sandlin when she popped up at Mr. Nice Guy Cocktails in April. Now, the chef is ready to officially open Sally O’s on Friday, July 31. Set in the former home of The Laughing Pint in Highlandtown, the restaurant will offer an array of small plates, sandwiches, pastas, and hearty mains for carryout and outdoor dining. Dishes to look out for include crab-stuffed jalapeño poppers, a summer salad with nectarines and sweet peppers, crispy eggplant lasagna, and a buttermilk chicken sandwich with szechuan pickles. Though Sandlin is still awaiting liquor license approval, she will be featuring a few mocktails and coffee drinks from Black Acres Roastery to get started.

Until Conditions Improve: After a temporary closure a few weeks ago, the owners of The Bluebird in Hampden went back to the drawing board to think of a socially distanced pop-up concept that they hoped would be able to withstand the ever-changing dining restrictions. What they came up with is a burger-and-milkshake stand aptly named Until Conditions Improve. Starting this week, diners can order boozy amaretto milkshakes, burgers, BLT hot dogs, cornmeal-crusted fried pickles, and some of the bar’s classic cocktails for to-go or outdoor patio service.

COMING SOON

Bmore Licks: Just as they did in Canton three years ago, Bmore Licks owners Kim Proctor and Barbara Maloni have commissioned a massive, hand-painted ice cream mural on the side of their new building in Federal Hill. Locals might have noticed the artwork at 901 Light St., which will soon open as Bmore Licks’ second location. Expect the same fun flavors of homemade hard ice cream and soft serve (favorites include butter crunch, lemon ginger cookie, and Zeke’s coffee toffee) to be delivered through safely distanced takeout windows when the shop debuts later this summer. Bmore Licks adds to the growing ice cream options in the neighborhood, which recently welcomed The Charmery and will soon host Taharka Bros. inside Cross Street Market.

Bushel and a Peck Kitchen & Bar: Iron Bridge Wine Company co-owner Rob Wecker is teaming up with chef Joe Krywucki to bring this Chesapeake Bay-inspired restaurant to the former home of Food Plenty in Clarksville this September. The Maryland natives and longtime friends plan to offer a menu that shows off the bounty of the Bay, with highlights including rockfish, shrimp, and, of course, Maryland crab. Wecker, who also happens to be a master sommelier, plans to create a list of local beer, wine, and cocktails to accompany all of the dishes.

CH-CH CHANGES

Di Pasquale’s Marketplace: After more than 100 years in Highlandtown, this community staple is moving to a larger space in Brewers Hill next year. Taking over the former home of Ceriello Fine Foods on the bottom of The Porter apartment building, the Italian market will be able to grow its production and give customers more room to breathe while browsing its famous cheeses, meats, and prepared foods. In a note announcing the move on Facebook, the Di Pasquale family assured regulars that, despite moving a mile away, their hearts will always be in Highlandtown: “We may be moving some of our operations, but that does not mean we will divest our interest in the Highlandtown community that has taken care of us for over a century. We are excited to take this next step with you.”

BAKERY BULLETIN

Kitsch: Pastry chef Jacqueline Mearman, most recently of Atlas Restaurant Group, took to Instagram last week to announce plans to open her own spot near the Johns Hopkins University campus. Slated to open in October, the shop will offer egg sandwiches, a curated coffee and tea program, and some of Mearman’s signature sweets.

Ovenbird Bakery: Follow the smell of fresh-baked bread to find this new bakery in Little Italy. The handwritten list of artisan offerings rotates daily, highlighting rye, sourdough, ciabatta, and Italian loaves. There’s also house-made scones, pressed paninis, and desserts like cheesecake and Key Lime pie.

Pekara Bakery: The spirit of European pastry palace Roggenart, which shuttered in Mt. Washington months back, now lives on in Roland Park. Serbian-born owner Radomir Mihajlovic and head baker Borislav Petkovic—both of whom previously worked for Roggenart—recently celebrated the grand opening of their new spot on Coldspring Lane. Carrying over many of their recipes featured at the old spot, Pekara features pastries such as butter croissants, walnut brioche, and a classic pain au raisin.

Pie Time Baltimore: The brick-and-mortar home for this farmers market favorite is getting close to opening in Patterson Park. Neighbors have likely seen the freshly painted storefront on the corner of East Baltimore and South Ellwood streets, where owner Max Reim plans to offer his sweet and savory pies along with the strong lattes, espressos, cappuccinos, and Americanos that fans know and love from his pop-ups.

EPICUREAN EVENTS

Ongoing: Johnny’s Sunday Pop-Up Market
Foreman Wolf Restaurant Group is continuing its weekly Sunday markets in the parking lot of Johnny’s and Petit Louis Bistro in Roland Park. From 8-11 a.m., shop fresh pastas and sauces from Cinghiale, empanadas and produce from Bar Vasquez, breakfast and coffee from Johnny’s, and a selection of wines from all of the restaurant’s cellars picked by co-owner Tony Foreman. Plus, produce from local farms and artwork created by Foreman Wolf employees.

8/2: Don’t Know Community Pop-Up: Lucifero Loaves
Federal Hill’s Don’t Know Tavern is a prime example of the “a rising tide lifts all boats” mantra that has been practiced among industry workers since the shutdown. Starting this weekend, husband-and-wife owners John and Brittany Leonard are supporting fellow food businesses by hosting a different pop-up in one of their carryout windows on weekends. Kicking things off on August 2 will be artisan baker Lucifero Loaves, a regular at the Overlea and Baltimore Museum of Industry farmers markets. Be on the lookout for other purveyors including Codetta Bakeshop, Wild Berry Farm Market, and The Salad Lady scheduled to appear throughout the rest of the summer.

8/6: Takeout Thursdays With Dining Out For Life
Locals might be familiar with Dining Out For Life as the one-day-only promotion in which area restaurants donate a portion of their sales to Moveable Feast, which feeds those who are critically ill. But in the midst of COVID-19, organizers are vowing to give back to the restaurants that have supported the cause for the past 27 years. In addition to accepting individual donations through September 17, Dining Out For Life is streaming virtual concerts, seminars, and showcases on Facebook Live on Thursday evenings with the hope that diners will tune in while enjoying takeout from one of its many restaurant partners. Coming up on August 6 is a live performance by local acoustic band The Befuddlers, followed by composer Peter Dayton live from The Owl Bar, and a discussion on the future of the Black Lives Matter movement with community organizer Andre Robinson.

SHUT

Chez Hugo Bistro: It’s no secret that the coronavirus has been devastating for the local restaurant scene, and among the latest spots that have announced closures is this beloved bistro in the historic Merchants Club building downtown. French-born chef Steve Monnier and co-owner Scott Helm announced last week that they made the decision to shutter the restaurant amid the restricted dining capacity and “enormous uncertainty around when these conditions might change.” For more than two years, the cozy dining room has been a place to feast on escargot, steak frites, and Monnier’s famous multi-course tasting menus served by stellar staff.

OPEN

Baby’s on Fire: The husband-and-wife owners behind Mt. Vernon’s record store cafe have taken their love of vinyl to a whole other level. After months of planning, David and Shirlé Koslowski—along with their partner, Michael Bowen, the former co-owner of the Ottobar—have opened a second location inside The Sound Garden in Fells Point. “We’re beyond ecstatic to be joining the Fells Point community and to bring them the love we’ve already been giving to Mt. Vernon,” David says. “Coffee shops and bars are all about community, and now with the opening of the Fells Point location, we have a space for that during the day and night.” Housed in the store’s old vinyl room, the cafe offers Stumptown Coffee and espresso drinks throughout the day, and craft beer and wine in the evening. After flipping through the bins, head into the cafe to read the liner notes over a pastry, sandwich, wrap, or hearty bowl of soup.

COMING SOON

The Manor: Robert Gay and Joshua Persing—the duo who previously operated G.A.Y. Lounge in the Mt. Vernon building that is now The Civil—are breathing new life into yet another one of the neighborhood’s historic spaces. In the coming months, they will transform the mansion that previously housed The Elephant, which closed for good amid drawn-out financial issues last spring, into a new dining-and-entertainment concept called The Manor. Alongside a selection of worldly cuisine, the spot will highlight EDM and house music, weekend entertainment, and routine drag brunches.

NEWS

Sally O’s: Two weeks ago, Highlandtown locals were saddened by the news that owner Shannon Cassidy would be closing beloved neighborhood hangout The Laughing Pint after 13 years. In her announcement, Cassidy assured patrons that she would be leaving the bar in “wonderful hands.” This week, it was announced that those hands belong to industry veteran Jesse Sandlin—a Top Chef alum who most recently has been heading up the kitchen at The Outpost American Tavern in Riverside. Sandlin is currently renovating the bar and hopes to reopen it as Sally O’s in February. “It’s been a dream of mine for a very long time to own my own place,” she said in a post to Facebook. “I’m happy that I’m able to do so in my home neighborhood.” Stay tuned for updates.

EPICUREAN EVENTS

11/21: Beaujolais Day at Chez Hugo

Head to Chez Hugo Bistro to celebrate Beaujolais Day—the third Thursday in November tradition that debuts a special red wine made with grapes from the Beaujolais region of France—with French-born chef Steve Monnier. Throughout the evening, diners will enjoy complimentary glasses of the early vintage release of Pierre-Marie Chermette Domaine du Vissoux’s Beaujolais Nouveau. Plus, other selections from the fifth-generation grower will be served, and there will also be bottles for sale for guests who wish to add to their own cellars at home.

11/24: Vegan Thanksgiving Pop-Up
Join vegan vlogger Antonio Simpson, more fondly known as The Vegan Mechanic, at this Thanksgiving pop-up that will be 100-percent vegan friendly. Head to The Greener Kitchen in Pigtown for meatless spins on classic smoked ham, deep-fried turkey, and baked macaroni and cheese. The $20 feast also includes Old Bay cajun green beans, garlic mashed potatoes, and fried Caribbean cabbage.

SHUT

Il Palio: This pizza-and-pasta spot inside the Foundry Row development in Owings Mills has closed its doors for good. A sign posted to the front door last week indicated that the restaurant’s final night of service was Thursday, November 14. “To the loyal customers we have proudly served, we thank you for your patronage, but regret to inform you that we are closing Il Palio,” wrote Kevin Gudejko, director of operations for restaurant group Mainstreet Ventures. Since opening in June 2018, the dining destination became known for its rustic Italian fare including Neapolitan pizzas, bountiful chopped salads, and tableside fettuccini alfredo tossed in wheel of imported parmigiano reggiano.