Ersatz LA in my Rural Corner

A Glowing Review of Kismet by Sara Kramer and Sara Hymanson

Kismet, at first glance, did not exactly seem up my alley. It’s a California restaurant cookbook—as a matter of fact, an LA cookbook—and I am decidedly not in LA, nor do I have the time and energy for cheffy cooking. In all sincerity, the book felt a bit out of my league.

I am admittedly still a moth to the millennial pink flame

I’m not very familiar with the LA restaurant scene, so I had never heart of Kismet or Kismet Rotisserie, the restaurants where the authors, Sara Kramer and Sarah Hymanson, are chef-owners. The only restaurant I really know that exists in LA is SUR, and I haven’t even kept up with that for years.

Then, I flipped through the book and it seemed a bit precious to me; trendy in a way I felt alienated from. The recipes are vaguely Mediterranean and Middle Eastern, but also very Californian.

It honestly, at first peruse, it appeared to be a bit of a superficial amalgamation of Alison Roman-ish vibes, Ottolenghi flavors, and some Molly Baz cutesy talk. Moreover, we all know that Californians have access to the actual Garden of Eden for produce, so I didn’t think I stood a chance.

“Eggy” is what my three year old stopped calling eggs 18 months ago.

But listen. I was so wrong. So very wrong. This book is the best cookbook discovery I have had in a long while. Coming out of left field for me, it knocked it out of the park. (Are those metaphors from the same sport? Please advise.)

Not only were the recipes delicious, they were novel, fresh, and easy.

(Clarkson Potter sent me this book for free, but all thoughts are my own.)

Zoom in cookbook nerds.

In the introduction, the authors write: “There are certainly dishes from this book from our restaurants, but they aren’t exactly how we’d make them there, nor should they be…We made every recipe in this book (several times!) in our no-dishwasher, no-frills home kitchens, adapting them for ease without sacrificing creativity or deliciousness.”

And that thought really shows. (Extra affection for my comrades in the no-dishwasher struggle.)

To Start, Chicken

If you don’t know Kismet the restaurant, it also has a sister restaurant called Kismet Rotisserie, so the roast chicken recipe (Roast Chicken with Schmaltzy Potatoes) seemed like a good choice as a first recipe to try.

To prepare, I ordered Aleppo pepper from Sur la Table ($11 plus shipping), and patiently awaited its arrival so I could begin.

The headnote says, “For the full experience, serve with Garlic Sauce (page 108) and Chile Crisp (page 107) for dipping and dousing,” and of course I wanted the full experience (goading successful), so that’s what I did.

For a side dish, I went to the fancy grocery store (ie the not Wal-Mart), and sourced some feta to make the Spicy Watermelon + Feta Salad. I couldn’t find a Fresno chile, however, so I subbed in a Serrano.

Chicken, potatoes, chile crisp, garlic sauce, watermelon salad

The chicken was fairly simple. Spatchcocked (delicious if slightly undignified) with a vaguely Middle Eastern rub, it was left to sit in the fridge and dry out for a while, à la Zuni Café, and then roasted over potatoes. The recipe was smartly written so that the potatoes began cooking before the chicken, then cooked with the chicken, then finished cooking while the chicken rested, all on the same sheet pan.

Unfortunately, I had only a lowly grocery store chicken, and the perfect timing was for naught. My chicken had to cook an extra 20 minutes outside of the recipe’s timing so the potatoes got a bit too crispy, then I had to pull out a second sheet pan and hoist the poor splayed bird over to it, and then the potatoes got cold while the chicken finished cooking. Still, this wasn’t a deal breaker as the whole thing was, in the end, delicious.

But it was the sauces that truly took it over the edge. I should admit I had to overcome a crippling fear of botulism to make them (don’t ask, don’t Google), but I am so glad I did.

The garlic sauce is a take on a Lebanese toum sauce. The authors advised me to poach some of the garlic to soften the sharpness of the allium and then called for instant potato flakes to stabilize the emulsion of garlic and oil. I have never had toum before, and am far from an expert in the fineries of Lebanese cuisine, but I am a wimp when it comes to raw garlic, so these changes were appreciated. The sauce was absolutely delicious.

The chile crisp was also quite good, with a hint of cinnamon that gives it a unique flavor. We put that sauce on everything for days. Together with the chicken, the meal in its entirety made me feel like I was sitting at a restaurant, experiencing something new and genuinely outstanding—which is no small feat when nearby small folk are smearing garlic sauce in all accessible crevices.

The salad was a perfect accompaniment, rounding the whole thing out. It was truly one of the best meals I have made in a while, and all without strenuous effort. For me, it was a welcome Mother’s Day gift, as making good food makes me feel more like myself and tasty food makes me happy.

Fish Tuesday, Refined

On Tuesdays, we eat fish. For this fish Tuesday (the day I am writing) we made Kismet salmon (The Only Way to Bake Salmon) with the recommended accompaniment Almond “Aioli,” a vegan aioli dupe.

The salmon is simply a low-and-slow baked salmon with a Pan-Mediterraneanish spice rub (paprika, Aleppo, caraway, garlic, coriander, orange zest) paired with a red onion, orange, and dill salad.

Salmon, orange salad, “aioli,” rice

The recipe called for a big slab of salmon, but because I only keep fillets in ye olde deep freeze, that’s what I used.

As I said, I made this literally tonight, a Tuesday, three hours ago, with two hungry creatures at my ankles, while easily leading an exuberant dance party. That is to say, it was very simple. And the payoff outweighed the effort by magnitudes.

I will make this salmon again. I will make it for you when you come over. I’m sold.

And Cookies

Can cookies be disappointing? Yes and no.

Cookie pile

There are many elaborate desserts in this book, but I chose the Tahini Chocolate Chip Cookies because I like cookies and I’m not really in a layered-pavlova-making era right now. Also, I love tahini in desserts.

These cookies were solid cookies—I ate them in quantity—but the tahini, in my opinion, really got lost. There’s a hint of bitterness, but that’s about it. The chocolate overwhelms the rest of tahini’s distinctiveness. It felt more like a gimmicky spin on the chipper rather than a noteworthy variation. It just became a more expensive chocolate chip cookie for no real benefit.

If I want a chocolate chip cookie, I think Alexandra Stafford’s are better. If I want a tahini cookie, my heart belongs to the Tahini Monster Cookie from Molly Yeh’s Home is Where the Eggs Are.

Also, the recipe said it made 24 cookies, and it made almost double that. Now, extra cookies are no one’s idea of a problem, but it’s worth noting.

I also made the gluten free pecan wedding/snowball cookie (A Good Gluten-Free Cookie) and really loved them.

Mid-sugar cookie,

These are really cinnamony, crumbly, sablé-like cookies. They are fairly simple, subbing in a gluten-free flour blend for traditional flour in a basic cookie recipe, and a bit finicky, with a rest in both the fridge and then the freezer.

Though not a cookie to throw together last minute, then, they’re not hard to assemble. They are also habit forming. By turns easy to walk by and pop in your mouth and hard to walk by and not pop in your mouth.

Final Thoughts

I think this book really is a gem, and I am excited to delve even deeper into it. Now that I have established its reliability and deliciousness, I am itching to get to the recipes that are a bit more of a project, like homemade labneh and Flaky Bread (Malawach).

One thought, however, is that even though the subtitle is “Bright, Fresh, Vegetable-Loving Recipes,” it’s not a vegetarian book. Though there is a chapter called “Main Event Veg,” all the recipes in it are arguably side dishes. So while that chapter along with a few others do not contain much meat, there are not a lot of veg main dishes.

The authors imagine “tapestries of little dishes” of vegetables as a full meal, which is a fun way to eat at a restaurant but at home it becomes tapestries of many things to make and dishes to wash. So if you want solid veg mains that aren’t a couple of sides mixed together, this isn’t the place to look.

Other than that, the food in the book is absolutely extraordinary. The recipe development was done with obvious care, creativity, and attention to detail. The pages are filled with exciting flavors and the book showcases the impressive talent of the chefs.

Even if you aren’t in LA and don’t plan to go there soon, this is a fun way to explore, um, Hollywood, or Rodeo Drive, or Beverley Hills? Is that right? I’m unfamiliar with the geography and not very cool. But now I can make a mean LA chicken.