The Only Two Seinfeld Episodes That Don't Feature Kramer

"The Chinese Restaurant" is often hailed as one of the all-time top episodes of "Seinfeld." 

The contained plot of Episode 11 of Season 2 was classic "Seinfeld," placing Elaine, Jerry, and George inside a Chinese restaurant for the entire run, as they are repeatedly told the table will be ready in five to 10 minutes. The ticking time bomb under the table is that they are running out of time to catch their movie, a showing of "Plan 9 From Outer Space" and who in their right mind would be late for that? 

Kramer is not seen in the entire episode, though he's not really needed as so much of the story's comedy is just the subtle absurdity of what seems at first like a Chinese restaurant, but soon morphs into a Lynchian nightmare where everything that can go wrong will go wrong. 

Kramer is not featured in the episode for an odd reason. It was so early in the show's run that his character hadn't been entirely fleshed out. At the time, the writers thought of him as a homebody who never left his apartment (which clearly proved not to be the case as the character evolved). In an interview for the DVD box set, producer Larry David said that if the signature episode had been written later in the run, they would have found a way to get Kramer involved in the plot.