RESTAURANT NEWS | MARYLAND
A Cameroonian Chef Opens a Secret Restaurant in Baltimore
Behind a bookshelf in downtown Baltimore, chef Loic Sany combines French technique with the flavors of Cameroon and the Caribbean.
NEST | MAP | INSTAGRAM
By Maria Rodriguez
7:15 a.m. ET, Sept. 14, 2026
AUTHOR BIO: With a day job that requires constant travel, Maria Rodriguez is likely a regular at your favorite restaurant. She’s reviewed restaurants since 2007 in magazines from Spain to Seattle.
A bookshelf swings open in downtown Baltimore, revealing purple walls, portraits of literary and historical figures, and chicken wings stuffed with shiitake mushrooms and capped with Osetra caviar. Nest has the required speakeasy theatrics, but the restaurant becomes considerably more interesting once chef Loic Sany starts cooking.
Sany opened Nest this summer above Jerk at Nite, near the Hippodrome Theatre in downtown Baltimore. The restaurant is his opportunity to build a menu entirely around his own history, beginning with childhood trips through a Cameroonian market alongside his grandmother. They shopped for nutmeg, black peppercorns, and peanut butter for her beef suya, a dish Sany now includes on a charcuterie board with smoked duck, lamb carpaccio, and cheese.
Loic Sany
After immigrating to the United States, Sany worked in restaurants in Washington, D.C., and California. Among them was Protégé in Palo Alto, where he served as sous chef and helped the restaurant earn a Michelin star during its first year.
Nest turns that training toward a compact menu of French-American plates threaded with African and Caribbean flavors. Butter-poached lobster is folded into potato croquettes with chive aioli. A tortilla made from plantains carries braised oxtail and pickled onions, while salmon crudo arrives with yuzu yogurt, dehydrated olives, chili oil, and trout roe.
The cocktails take similar liberties. Coal & Cane combines oxtail fat-washed bourbon, demerara, house bitters, and pimento smoke. Light After Dark pairs clarified tequila with Peruvian coffee, cane syrup, and coconut foam. Even cheesecake gets black pepper.
The restaurant’s purple-toned dining area carries the speakeasy motif without surrendering entirely to Prohibition cosplay. Jazz accompanies service late into the evening, and Sany frequently carries dishes to the tables himself, explaining the memories or techniques behind them.
Nest gives Sany a stage for cooking that belongs entirely to him. The menu moves from his grandmother’s Cameroonian market to the French techniques he learned in Michelin-starred kitchens, with a few Caribbean turns along the way. The bookshelf may get diners through the door, but the plantain oxtail tacos and caviar-topped wings give them something better to talk about afterward.
At The Pretender in Noblesville, vintage hi-fi sound and chef Ricky Martinez’s menu meet.
By JAMIE DUTTON
Staten Island's new Aqualine serves seafood towers and an eight-course tasting menu.
By MARIA RODRIGUEZ