In 2025, The Baltimore Sun published hundreds of stories about restaurants, food and drink. Among reports of openings and closures, expansions and collaborations, transplants and relocations, several overlapping trends emerged.
As the year came to a close, many local restaurateurs reflected on moments of pride and pain in 2025, as well as their hopes for 2026.
Longstanding institutions close their doors
After five years in business, beloved Catonsville bakery Charlsie’s Bakehouse closed in June — a decision owner Morgaine Brunn said in a social media post was not easy.
“The hardest moments were realizing we weren’t going to see the familiar faces day in day out that we’ve seen for the past few years,” she added in a Wednesday statement to The Baltimore Sun. Brunn and her husband shut down the sweet shop to “focus on family” in preparation for the arrival of her newborn. “A lot of customers became more like friends, and [it’s] hard to step away from all that and turn to a quieter life.”
Although Brunn took pride in baking Charlsie’s scratch-made cookies and savory hand pies daily, she said she often worked 15-hour days that made maintaining a healthy work-life balance difficult. She also cited rising costs as a significant strain on her business and others like it.
Rockville deli-bar Gilly’s Craft Beer & Fine Wine cited “the current economic climate” as the reason for its October closure, saying in a social media post that it had “become challenging to survive” after 17 years.
Other notable restaurant closures in 2025 included Reisterstown’s nearly 40-year-old Grill at Harryman House in March, for which ownership did not disclose a reason, and Skipjack’s Crab House, a chain with more than 50 years of local history, which shuttered its Overlea location in November after its lease was not renewed.
“It is very difficult to operate a food business in the past few years,” Brunn said. “We hope [diners] support community-focused places.”
Local chefs expand, relocate and join forces
While some Baltimore-area chefs downsized in 2025, others expanded or relocated.
In early December, Culinary Architecture began relocating from its 10-year-old Pigtown home to Little Italy. Owner Sylva Lin said the move was necessary as the gourmet market outgrew its original space.
“As we continue to grow, our kitchen space did not continue to grow. It’s very small,” Lin said of the Pigtown location in a previous interview with The Sun. “We knew we had to move somewhere that was central, that had more foot traffic … a place that had a lot of energy but was still a community.”
Chihuahua Brothers, a plant-forward taqueria, relocated from its Abell storefront to Mid-Town Belvedere in June. Owner Kevyn Matthews said the decision was driven by crime concerns, building conditions and a property lead at the Biddle Street Inn.
After months of on-and-off operation, Matthews now hopes to set the business up for success by “starting small.” He has teamed up with a restaurant consultant, with whom he hopes to reimagine the menu and reopen Chihuahua Brothers, complete with a bar stocked with Mexican wine and beer, in early January.
“I look forward to becoming Baltimore’s destination spot for good cocktails, Mexican beer, great food and good times,” Matthews said in a Wednesday interview. “I want to be the best at it.”
Other chefs joined forces to open two mashup concepts in the Baltimore area in 2025 — the first, Headquarters in Waverly, a joint restaurant between My Mama’s Vegan owner Debonette Wyatt, Love, Puddin’ food truck owner Denisha Hightower-Alston and Gorgeous Gourmet caterer Katie Fickling; the second, an Ellicott City kitchen housing both Bagel Bin and Roma Pizza.
“It’s always more fun with your friends,” Fickling said in a Wednesday interview. “We knew that would be more successful together than apart. It made it easier to know that everybody would pull their own weight.”
In a Wednesday statement, Bagel Bin owner Jake Spain added that, although the shop relocated “instead of being bought out or closing altogether,” the new collaborative kitchen “allowed both concepts to operate side by side while continuing to maintain what makes each unique.”
Mixed-use developments grow restaurant roster
Developments across Maryland welcomed, and continue to anticipate the arrival of, new restaurants.
In Harbor Point, local chef Spike Gjerde opened bistro La Jetée in October, while Korean fried chicken shop Chicken Lab opened its first brick-and-mortar restaurant in the complex in September. Restaurants coming soon to Harbor Point include “superfood cafe” Grain & Berry, former Alma Cocina Latina chef David Zamudio’s Spanish restaurant Josefina and Verde chef Ed Bosco’s Italian eatery Sartori.
Several restaurants have also signed leases, with some beginning operations, in the Baltimore Peninsula complex. Among them are LIVE-K Karaoke, Urbano Tex-Mex and Shinkansen Sushi, a conveyor-belt sushi concept by restaurateur David Chen.
Outside the city, other restaurants have found homes in Baltimore-area shopping centers, including Miss Toya’s Creole House at Metro Centre at Owings Mills, Phở Live at Columbia Crossing and TaquerÃa Parranda at Dobbin Center.
Out-of-state restaurants to make Maryland debuts
While several Maryland restaurants grew in 2025, other out-of-state concepts will land in Maryland in 2026.
Hailing from Philadelphia, renowned cheesesteak shop Geno’s Steaks will open a location in Baltimore’s Power Plant Live! complex in early 2026. In a previous interview with The Sun, owner Geno Vento said Baltimore will be “a nice area” to begin the chain’s expansion.
“There’s so much going on. It’s lively. It has the arts, it has the nightlife. It has the gaming. It has the harbor. It has the stadiums,” Vento said. “It has the excitement of Philly, but just a different city.”
Connecticut’s PopUp Bagels, which has spurred lines at its locations across the country, will make its way to Bethesda in 2026. Just down the coast, two New-York-born restaurants also announced expansions to Maryland: burger joint 7th Street Burger, now open in Canton, and Michelin-recommended Nan Xiang Soup Dumplings, now open in Bethesda.
In Maryland, “there’s a real appreciation for local food and culture which aligns perfectly with Nan Xiang,” wrote CEO Eddie Zheng in a Wednesday statement. “The Baltimore area is the exact type of market that we want to bring the Nan Xiang brand to.”
Have a news tip? Contact Jane Godiner at jgodiner@baltsun.com or on Instagram as @Jane.Craves.
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