Chef Job Description
Overview
A Chef is a skilled, professional cook who is proficient in all aspects of food preparation. Their role is studying recipes, setting up menus, and preparing high-quality dishes. Their responsibilities are to set up the kitchen with cooking utensils and equipment, gather all necessary ingredients, cook food promptly, delegate tasks to kitchen staff, inform wait staff about daily specials, ensure appealing plate presentation, supervise cooks and assist as needed, monitor food stock and place orders, check the freshness of food and discard out-of-date items, and ensure compliance with all health and safety regulations.
Steps to take to start your career as a Chef and other jobs like it
- There are a variety of different training programs. The shortest are certificate programs completed less than a year, next are associate degrees in culinary arts and the longest being 4 year bachelor programs. All of these programs require a GED or high school diploma.
- Everyone knows how to eat but building a career in cooking or baking takes practice. Whether you have formal training or not, practicing on your own, working in a restaurant and or working under an experienced chef is important.
- You likely will need to work your way through many different roles in the kitchen to gain the experience needed to advance to ones that allow you to use your creativity.
- There are many different environments for chef’s to work in, hotels, restaurants, catering, cafe’s. There are different skills to be learned from each, some of which extend beyond cooking to the business side of the trade.
Pastry Chef:
Hi, my name is Ryan. I am a professional pastry chef and ice cream maker. I'm also a writer, a massage therapist, but ice cream is where I'm currently focusing on.
Career Skill:
One requirement for this job is to 100% be organized.
Career Advice:
My biggest piece of advice for anyone entering this industry is to be okay with failing, fail a lot, and learn from that.
Career Concerns:
One of the biggest things I'm concerned about in this industry is a work-life balance and making enough money to actually survive. And also, you know, it is physical, so I'm worried about burning out.
Career Motivation:
I was motivated to start this career because I've always cooked, I've always baked, and it just kind of seemed like a natural fit for me to go into that industry.
Important Lesson Learned:
I went to pastry school in Chicago and after that I worked for a really well-known chef, and it was the most awful experience I've ever had in my life in this career. And I learned a lot, but I also learned what kind of chef I wanted to be and what kind of chef I didn't want to be.
Career Goal:
My ultimate goal for myself is to actually have a brick and mortar shop. Right now I'm doing a lot of wholesale comps and farmer's markets, so I would like an actual space for the ice cream shop. So right now I'm just going to keep doing everything that I'm doing and eventually work my way towards that.
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Education you need to become a Chef
These are the most common degrees or certificates earned by Jobtrees users prior to becoming a Chef
There may be other required degrees or certifications needed for this job. The below info shows you the most commonly desired education level from employers when hiring for this job.
- Associate Degree in Culinary Arts
- Bachelor of Arts (b.a.) in Physics Education
- Associate Degree in Associate of Arts
Annual Pay Estimate for Chef and Other Important Info
See how many years Chef's are in their job, how much they make, how long it took to get there and how available this job is in terms of open positions.
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Career Paths for Chef
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