Sarah Krathen fell in love with restaurant work at the age of fifteen. She started as a barker for a restaurant on Duval Street in Key West, which meant her job was to get tourists to come in off the street and eat there. The owner of Fogarty’s, a much bigger, newer, and better restaurant, saw her at work and hired her as a hostess. At Fogarty’s, she went from hostess to server to expo (the intermediary between the kitchen and the customers) and then decided to attend culinary school. She enrolled in the Culinary Institute of America, received an associate degree in culinary arts, and then completed a fellowship under her mentor, John Storm, in the on-campus Ristorante Caterina de’ Medici. It was during that fellowship that she met Emma Hearst, a meeting that she describes as the most important of her life. The pair became best friends, roommates, and eventually business partners. Sorella opened on New York’s Lower East Side in 2008, with Sarah managing the front of the house and beverage program. In Fall 2013, Sarah and Emma launched their debut cookbook:Sorella: Recipes, Cocktails & True Stories from our New York Restaurant, featuring over 100 recipes adapted from the Sorella’s menu, woven together by the story of how they went from culinary school friends to young business partners, driven by a shared dream of opening a restaurant. This program has been sponsored by Tabard Inn. Today’s music provided by The Hollows.

“We were nobodies, but we mentioned that we wanted to open a restaurant, and we were treated like gold.” [11:40]

“She took some things off the menu that I never thought would come off..but I realized that was a good idea.” [25:25]

Sarah Krathen on In The Drink

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