London’s Berenjak has made its way to Los Angeles.
The Michelin Bib Gourmand-winning contemporary Iranian restaurant opened in downtown L.A.’s Arts District’s Soho Warehouse on Sept. 24, but they gave us a sneak peek days before.
“Berenjak was created to fill a gap,” explained Kian Samyani, the restaurant’s founder and chef. “It’s Persian food through my lens and how I like to eat it at home. Our concept isn’t created around kebab and rice. It’s more to do with kebab and bread and how I enjoy eating kebab, and especially how I enjoyed eating it when I used to go to Tehran when I was little.”
Samyani said he used to go back to Tehran every year to see his family and friends, which left him with “vivid memories” of going to hole-in-the-wall establishments, which inspired Berenjak’s concept.
“You’d go inside, you’d place your order, you’d get a big tray of like bread, you’d go outside, you’d get a ticket, you’d go out onto the street, and you’d give this man your ticket. He’d cook your kebabs on the grill. He’d lift your lavash bread, he’d put it inside and pull out the skewers and then send you on your way. And it’s those kinds of romantic memories of kebab with bread that I wanted to replicate at the restaurant.”
Since opening in London in 2018, Berenjak has evolved, explained manager Julia Kaniewska.
“I think we opened the door for a new kind of Iranian restaurant that people wanted. They were hungry for an Iranian concept that wasn’t the same as a traditional Iranian restaurant,” Samyani said. “The restaurant’s become a huge thing. I would have never thought opening a 40-seat Iranian restaurant in London would become what it has.”
Kaniewska called the opening of the L.A. restaurant “surreal,” but honored the regular patrons at their Soho location in London for helping them push forward.
“We have people to this day, guests who come to Soho every Saturday, who have been coming for the last seven years, and they know the team’s name, and they come in and hug everyone and shake everyone’s hand, and that has been such a huge part of the success of the restaurants. It has allowed us to open our second one, which, again, when it first happened, we never even dreamed of opening a second restaurant.”
The eatery has a long-standing relationship with the private club Soho House. Since 2019, they’ve done festivals and pop-ups with the brand. Their first semi-permanent location was at the Soho Farmhouse in the Cotswolds in England.
“Then we opened Dumbo House last year in Brooklyn, New York, which was such a surreal moment to eat Berenjak foods, looking out at the Brooklyn Bridge skyline,” she exclaimed.
In addition to London, there are Berenjak locations in the United Arab Emirates and Qatar.
While the DTLA restaurant is in the Soho Warehouse, it is open to the general public.
“Here we’ve got our own entrance, we’ve got valet. You’ve got some street presence,” Samyani said. “You can come in, you can walk in, you can book. You can book on the Soho House tab. You can book on our website. It’s a bit of a game-changer.”
The Los Angeles location has a combination of a beautiful outdoor space where guests can dine in a garden-like atmosphere, or head inside for a vibe of dark lights, candlelight and loud music.
“The restaurant really comes alive at night when it’s full, and it feels so amazing when it’s dark here,” Kaniewska said. “It’s got this beautiful balance of a really intimate indoor space with that dim lighting, and then the outdoor space with a garden and really making the most of L.A.”
As for the menu, Samyani said Berenjak wanted to emphasize the fresh bread and the “eating and dipping and ripping and sharing” until the main course, which are the kebabs.
The Omlette Irani is one of Samyani’s go-to dishes at home, a comforting recipe his father often made for him during childhood. He shared it with California Cooking viewers, inviting them to enjoy a taste of his family tradition.
This segment aired on California Cooking with Jessica Holmes, Episode 194.
Omelette Irani
Courtesy: Chef Kian Samyani of Berenjak
Prep Time: 10 mins
Cook Time: 15 mins
Serves: 2
Ingredients:
- 4 large eggs
- 3 medium ripe tomatoes, concassé (peeled, seeded, and finely chopped)
- 1 medium onion,
- 2 cloves garlic, minced
- 2 tbsp tomato paste
- Salt, to taste
- Black pepper, to taste
- 1/2 tsp turmeric powder
- 2–3 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
- Flatbread (Barbari, Sangak, or Taftoon), to serve
🔪 Instructions:
- Prepare the tomatoes (concassé):
- Bring a pot of water to a boil. Score a small “X” on the bottom of each tomato.
- Blanch for 30 seconds, then transfer to ice water.
- Peel, seed, and finely chop the tomatoes. Set aside.
- Sauté garlic:
- Heat oil in a non-stick or heavy-bottomed pan over medium-low heat.
- Add minced garlic and sauté gently until golden, stirring constantly — take care not to brown it too much to avoid bitterness.
- If it begins to brown too quickly, add 1 tbsp of water to cool the pan slightly and prevent burning.
- Add onion (optional):
- Stir in chopped onion and cook until soft and translucent, about 5–7 minutes.
- Build the tomato base:
- Add the concassé tomatoes to the pan.
- Stir in the tomato paste, turmeric, salt, and pepper.
- Simmer over medium heat for 7–10 minutes, until the tomatoes break down and the mixture thickens and deepens in colour.
- Add the eggs:
- Crack the eggs directly over the tomato mixture.
- Gently stir just a couple of times — you want ribbons of yolk and white running through the sauce, not a uniform scramble.
- Let cook over low-medium heat until the eggs are just set but still soft (3–4 minutes).
- Serve:
- Serve immediately with warm flatbread, and if desired you can add a few knobs of butter for a richer taste