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Sarah Simmons
James Beard Award winner
- Discipline
- Other
i. Biography
Sarah Simmons built City Grit in New York City as a working framework for restaurant, hospitality group, and culinary salon work. The throughline is not scale for its own sake but control of format: a place, a group, and a salon that let Simmons keep the kitchen, the room, and the point of view aligned.
Coming Up
The first clear marker in this body of work was Birds & Bubbles in Manhattan's Lower East Side, New York City (2016–2017), where Sarah Simmons served as executive chef-owner. The role placed the restaurant at the center of her practice and established the blend that would continue to define it: restaurant cooking shaped by a distinct point of view, with hospitality carrying equal weight. From there, the work expanded into multiple lanes without losing its center. Since 2011, Simmons has been chef and proprietor and executive chef and creator of City Grit; since 2016, ceo of City Grit Hospitality Group, founder of City Grit Culinary Salon, and chef and owner of Rise Gourmet Go To Bake Shop; and since 2018, chef of Small Sugar. Taken together, those roles describe a portfolio built around making and managing spaces where food is not isolated from the room around it. City Grit sits at the core of that structure in New York City. The name is used here as a working brand, but the craft beneath it is clearer than the label: creating a culinary identity that can hold restaurant service, hospitality leadership, and a salon format without flattening any one of them. As ceo of City Grit Hospitality Group, Simmons extended that approach into an organizational layer. The City Grit Culinary Salon adds another mode, one that turns food into a setting for gathering and exchange. Rise Gourmet Go To Bake Shop, brought in 2016, adds a baked-goods register to the same body of work, while Small Sugar, where Simmons has served as chef since 2018, shows the range continuing in Columbia, South Carolina.
Where They Are Now
Simmons is Chief Executive Officer of City Grit Hospitality Group and founder of City Grit in New York City. That current lineup keeps the work split between leadership and direct kitchen authorship. City Grit places Simmons in the role of builder and operator; Birds & Bubbles keeps her tied to the restaurant floor and the chef’s side of the operation. The result is a practice that moves between structure and service without treating them as separate disciplines.
Profile updated July 2026
FAQ
Asked of Sarah
What recognition has Sarah Simmons received?
50 Best Chefs in New York City (2014).
