You might be surprised to find out that the star dish at a restaurant called Kismet Rotisserie is not, in fact, the rotisserie chicken, but a humble wedge salad composed of iceberg lettuce soaked in a vegan miso poppy seed dressing and crowned with colorful radishes. To the two chefs behind Kismet Rotisserie, Sara Kramer and Sarah Hymanson, the ’90s-inspired dish is their restaurant’s sleeper hit.

The fact that Kramer and Hymanson even met at all, and then both decided to pack up their lives in New York for the sunshine of Los Angeles, could itself be described as kismet. Kramer was a Mamma Mia! Broadway singer from the Bronx, while Hymanson was a Chicago-born acrobat with a cooking fascination. It was meat that eventually brought them together: they met while working at the Meat Hook and Brooklyn Kitchen, the Williamsburg butcher shop and cooking school.

One thing the Sara(h)s do have in common, however, is their obsession with vegetables. “Vegetables are definitely our north star,” Kramer says. “It’s what we shape our menus around and it’s how we think about food first and foremost.” When the pair opened their first LA restaurant in 2015, a falafel cafe called Madcapra (later known as Kismet Falafel) in downtown’s Grand Central Market, the menu was entirely dominated by vegetables. Their subsequent restaurants, Kismet and Kismet Rotisserie, followed suit with big green salads and veggie sandwiches, Moroccan-spiced carrots, vegan dips, and roasted maitake mushrooms.

So it’s no surprise that plants get similar love in Kramer and Hymanson’s new cookbook — they’re right there in the title, Kismet: Bright, Fresh, Vegetable-Loving Recipes. The book’s largest chapter is titled ‘Salady,’ and showcases Kramer and Hymanson’s creativity with the incredible produce found in Southern California. “There’s so much potential and it’s an endlessly versatile category,” Kramer says. “You can build a lot of flavor and have a lot of different textures. It’s one of our most playful sections to dream in.”

One of the chapter’s standouts is its wedge salad with miso poppyseed dressing, a recipe that takes Hymanson back to her teenage years in the ’90s. “Between the two of us, we wanted Rotisserie to be a bit ’90s-themed, and I feel like poppy seed vinaigrette had a comeback in the ’90s,” Hymanson explains. “It was a big part of my childhood.”

The goal was to make a nostalgic dressing that’s creamy like ranch or blue cheese but entirely vegan. The base begins with leftover aquafaba from all the chickpeas the restaurant goes through. “Normally, poppy seed dressing is full of sugar, so we were trying to make a vinaigrette with a little bit more depth — more wholesome, nuanced, and fresh,” Hymanson says. That meant honey as a sweetener, miso paste for umami, and classic ingredients like white vinegar, onion powder, and lemon juice.

“It’s a very simple thing, but the vinaigrette actually took some real thought to get something light, creamy, and satisfying,” Kramer says. “It really hits the right notes.”

Wedge Salad with Miso-Poppy Dressing

(Serves 4)

Ingredients:

For the miso-poppy dressing:

¼ cup white miso
1 tablespoon plus 1 teaspoon honey
1 teaspoon yellow mustard
1 teaspoon onion powder
1 tablespoon kosher salt
⅓ cup distilled white vinegar
Grated zest of ½ lemon
2 tablespoons lemon juice (about 1 lemon)
⅓ cup aquafaba, from 1 (15-ounce) can chickpeas
1 cup neutral oil, such as canola or sunflower
1½ teaspoons poppy seeds

For the salad:

1 head iceberg lettuce, cut into 4 wedges
6 to 8 radishes, any variety, thinly sliced on a mandoline
2 scallions, thinly sliced into rounds
1 cup parsley leaves

Instructions:

Step 1: Make the miso-poppy dressing: In a blender, combine the miso, honey, mustard, onion powder, salt, vinegar, lemon zest, lemon juice, and aquafaba. Blend on medium-high speed for 10 seconds and, while the blender is still running, stream in the oil, pouring slowly to emulsify.

Step 2: Once the oil is completely incorporated, add the poppy seeds and blend for just a second or two to distribute, then turn off the blender immediately. Store in the fridge until ready to use.

Step 3: Assemble the salad: Place the wedges of iceberg on a platter (or plate individually). Spoon a generous amount of the dressing over the wedges. Scatter the radishes, scallions, and parsley over the top.

Kismet: Bright, Fresh, Vegetable-Loving Recipes Copyright © 2024 by Sara Kramer and Sarah Hymanson. Photographs copyright © 2024 by Chris Bernabeo. Published by Clarkson Potter, an imprint of Crown Publishing Group.