Sara Kramer started working with her future business partner, Sarah Hymanson, in 2013. Working as the opening chef at Glasserie in Brooklyn, Kramer was in desperate need of kitchen help. One night, Hymanson, whom Kramer had briefly met a few years earlier, came to Glasserie for dinner. At the time, Hymanson was in between jobs after having cooked for Blue Hill at Stone Barns, a high-end restaurant in upstate New York. Kramer, who once worked at Blue Hill, walked up to her table to recruit her. Hymanson left dinner with a job as the restaurant’s new sous chef.
Glasserie, which serves Mediterranean-meets-Middle-Eastern food inspired by Kramer’s Sephardic roots, from lamb and bulgur croquettes to a whole rabbit for two, became the foundation of their long partnership. “We developed a huge amount of respect for each other,” says Hymanson, 37. “We not only trust each other’s judgment and taste, but we also know that we will both work hard at all times with a lot of intention.”
In 2014, they both left Glasserie, which is still open but under a different chef, and made the leap from New York to Los Angeles. The cross-country move was “impulsive,” admits Kramer, 38, a New York native. “We foolishly thought it would be easier” in L.A. There, they opened their first business together, Madcapra, a falafel stand in downtown’s Grand Central Market, in 2015.
“My background is not Middle Eastern or Mediterranean at all,” says Hymanson, who grew up in Chicago. “My culinary references are outside of that world. [Madcapra] was a place where we could have some freedom with a structure that was bread and chickpea fritters.”
After earning favorable reviews for their falafel, they decided to open a sit-down restaurant. Kismet, a “vegetable-loving restaurant for food, wine, and friends,” as their slogan puts it, came to Los Feliz in 2017. The menu ranges from flaky malawach (a Yemenite flatbread) to Persian crispy rice, a skillet-baked basmati-rice dish topped with pumpkin seeds and dried currants. Los Angeles Magazine named the crispy rice the city’s “most essential dish” of 2017.
With Kismet’s success, the duo closed Madcapra and opened a casual offshoot, Kismet Rotisserie, in 2020, down the block from the original. There, the star dish is the crispy-skinned rotisserie chicken with a secret seasoning that includes turmeric and Aleppo-style pepper, served with garlic sauce and chili oil. Side dishes include “schmaltzy” potatoes cooked in rendered chicken fat, homemade hummus with fluffy pita, and tahini-roasted vegetables.
After opening two more Kismet Rotisseries, in Culver City and Studio City, Kramer and Hymanson are now bringing their recipes to home kitchens. Publishing May 7, their first cookbook includes more than 100 recipes, from a persimmon salad to their beloved rotisserie chicken. Asked to pick a favorite dish from the book, Hymanson says she can’t, that it’s like asking a mother to pick her favorite child. Kramer nods in agreement.
Their book tour starts next week in New York. “It definitely feels like a homecoming,” says Hymanson.
Kismet: Bright, Fresh, Vegetable-Loving Recipes will be available from Clarkson Potter beginning May 7
Carolina de Armas is an Associate Editor at AIR MAIL