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Pickles Pub is a family-friendly, game-day institution that has been serving classic pub fare since March 1988. Located across from Oriole Park at Camden Yards and near M&T Bank Stadium, it has become a Baltimore favorite among Orioles and Ravens fans, tourists, and downtown regulars. Bustling and teeming with customers before the pandemic? For sure. Empty seats and tables during the pandemic? Co-owner Tom Leonard and his staff had to pivot greatly. 

“Because we have a good brand name and we’re right across from the ballpark, the business always came to us,” he said, during a recent Beverage Journal interview. “Our whole business acumen was ‘How can we maximize this?’ and ‘How can we get more people in here and make them happy?’ Online ordering, having a social media presence, and all of that stuff – we did it, but it was an after-thought. When the pandemic happened, we didn’t transition incredibly well, because we thought like so many others, ‘Oh, by the latest, things will get back to normal in June or July.’”

If you are reading this article and you have ever eaten at the Sunset Restaurant in Glen Burnie, then right now you are probably fondly remembering the iconic eatery’s cream of crab soup. Or maybe their shrimp salad. Or you’re just smiling at the memory of some leisurely meals you enjoyed with your friends, family, or colleagues.

Chances are, Mike Fratantuono was somewhere in your orbit during those meals. He was one of the three long-time proprietors of Sunset along with Dave and Gary Fratantuono. The family operated the restaurant for 60 years until pandemic times forced its closure at the end of last September. 

A new generation of products aims to shrink the beverage alcohol industry’s carbon footprint for a more sustainable future

By Betsy Andrews

As a drinks writer, I get sent a lot of bottles in a lot of packaging. Among recent deliveries: three mattress-thick, plastic-wrapped slabs of molded foam cushioning a single liter of boxed wine; a styrofoam shell made for three 750-milliliter bottles containing one half-bottle of vermouth; a heavy glass bottle of “sustainable” Malbec in a bed of styrofoam peanuts; and eight tiny, unbreakable Burgundy samplers in 20-milliliter plastic bottles nested in a shippable box that was itself swaddled in bubble wrap and tucked inside a much larger carton.

Vineyard longevity, higher quality, and consumer demand create a healthier bottom line for organically farmed wines

By Pam Strayer

From $4 Trader Joe’s organic wine to high-end Bordeaux, growers and vintners are seeing that organic farming costs are not the barrier they were once considered to be. More experience and know-how, improved materials, and new equipment have created better production methods that can make organic as financially profitable as farming conventionally.