Chef Job Description: Duties, Requirements, Template & Pay (2026)
A chef — a head chef, executive chef or chef de cuisine, in kitchen terms — runs the back of house: the menu, the ordering, the cost, the schedule, the standards and the people. This page covers the duties employers actually hire for, a copy-paste chef job description template with head chef, sous chef and kitchen manager versions, the requirements that matter versus the ones that shrink your pool, and where restaurant kitchen roles sit against Boostpoint's 2026 cost-per-applicant benchmark.
Chef duties and responsibilities
The title covers a ladder, and postings that don't say which rung they're hiring for get the wrong applicants. An executive chef at a hotel, club, senior living community or multi-outlet operation owns the P&L for food, menus across outlets, and a team of sous chefs. A head chef or chef de cuisine runs one kitchen — menu, ordering, labor, standards — and cooks on the line most nights. A sous chef is the second: runs service when the chef is off, does prep lists and orders, and trains the line. A kitchen manager is the same job at a volume restaurant with a fixed menu, where the work is scheduling, cost and consistency rather than menu development. Pay, hours and the applicant pool differ at each rung.
Day to day, chef responsibilities include:
- Plan and develop menus and recipes; set portion sizes, plating and presentation standards; cost each item to a target food-cost percentage
- Order and requisition food, supplies and equipment; inspect deliveries for quality and quantity; manage inventory and reduce waste
- Supervise and coordinate line cooks, prep cooks and dishwashers during prep and service; expedite the pass; taste and check every dish
- Hire, train, schedule and evaluate kitchen staff; run pre-shift meetings; build the schedule to forecasted covers and labor targets
- Monitor sanitation and food safety: temperature logs, storage, labeling, allergen handling, health department compliance; hold the food safety manager certification
- Estimate food and labor costs; track daily and weekly numbers against budget; adjust menus, purchasing and staffing to hit targets
- Maintain equipment; report and arrange repairs; keep the kitchen organized and safe
- Coordinate with the front of house, events and catering on specials, menus, allergies and timing
- Cook on the line during service as needed; cover stations and train new cooks
The BLS counted about 197,300 chefs and head cooks in 2024, most of them in restaurants, hotels, and institutional food service, and projects growth of 7% or more through 2034 — much faster than average — with roughly 24,400 openings a year. The median wage was $30.03 an hour in 2025, or $62,470 a year; executive chefs at hotels, clubs and larger operations, and chefs in high-cost metros, earn well above that. Kitchens have run short of cooks at every level since 2020, and chef turnover follows cook turnover: a chef who can't staff a line leaves. The job description should therefore describe the kitchen's staffing reality and the schedule honestly, because those are the two things an experienced chef is actually evaluating. Our hospitality staffing agency cost page covers what filling kitchen roles through agencies costs by comparison.
Chef job description template
Copy this into your ATS or job board, replace the bracketed fields, and cut what doesn't apply. It leads with the rung, pay, schedule and the kitchen — because a working chef reading it is comparing those four things against the kitchen they run now.
Job title
[Head Chef / Executive Chef / Sous Chef / Kitchen Manager] — [Restaurant type / Hotel / Club / Senior Living], [Full-time], [City, State]
Summary
[Restaurant / Property] is hiring a [head chef] for our [X]-seat [cuisine / concept] kitchen in [City], doing [X] covers on a weekend night with a team of [X] cooks. Salary is $[XX,XXX]–$[XX,XXX] [or $XX–$XX/hour] based on experience, with a [quarterly bonus of up to X% tied to food cost and labor targets]. Schedule is [five days, roughly 50 hours, two consecutive days off, closed Mondays]; [we close Christmas and Thanksgiving]. You'll own the menu [within the concept], ordering from [vendors], scheduling, food cost and training, reporting to [the owner / GM / F&B director]. Food safety manager certification required; [culinary degree not required].
Responsibilities
- Develop, cost and execute the menu; set plating and portion standards; run specials
- Order, receive and manage inventory to a [X]% food-cost target; minimize waste
- Hire, train, schedule and lead a team of [X] line and prep cooks and dishwashers
- Run service: expedite, quality-check every plate, cover stations as needed
- Maintain health department, food safety and allergen compliance; keep temperature and cleaning logs
- Track daily food and labor numbers against budget; adjust purchasing and staffing
- Maintain equipment and a safe, organized kitchen; coordinate with front of house and events
Requirements
- [3+] years as a sous chef or chef in a [comparable volume / cuisine] kitchen
- Food safety manager certification (ServSafe or [state] equivalent), or ability to obtain within [30] days
- Experience managing food cost, inventory and scheduling; comfortable with [Toast / R365 / MarginEdge]
- Able to stand and work in a hot kitchen for a full shift, lift [50] lbs, and work nights, weekends and holidays as scheduled
- Legally authorized to work in the U.S.; able to pass a background check
Preferred
- Culinary degree or apprenticeship
- Experience opening a kitchen, writing menus from scratch, or [banquet / catering / high-volume brunch]
- Allergen and [state] alcohol-service certifications
- [Bilingual English/Spanish]
Schedule and pay
- $[XX,XXX]–$[XX,XXX] salary [or $XX–$XX/hour] depending on experience
- [Quarterly bonus up to X% of salary on food cost and labor targets]
- [Relocation assistance]; [sign-on bonus $X,XXX]
- Schedule: [five days, ~50 hours, two consecutive days off]; [closed Mondays and major holidays]
Benefits
- Medical, dental and vision after [30/60] days
- [401(k) with X% match]
- Paid time off [X weeks] and [paid holidays / holiday premium]
- Paid certifications and continuing education; [travel to food shows / stages]
- [Shift meals, dining discount, uniform and knife allowance]
Requirements: what's required, what's preferred, and what kills applications
There's no license to be a chef; the only regulatory requirement in most jurisdictions is a certified food protection manager on staff. Everything else is a choice, and in a market where every kitchen is short of cooks, the choices that shrink the pool are expensive.
| Requirement | What to know |
|---|---|
| Food safety manager certification | Required by most state and local health codes for at least one person per establishment (ServSafe Manager or an ANSI-accredited equivalent). Require it "within 30 days" and pay for the course; don't make it a pre-application filter. |
| Culinary degree | Not required and held by a minority of working chefs. List as preferred; a degree tells you far less than the last three kitchens. |
| Experience | Specify the rung and the comparable: "3 years as a sous chef in a 150-cover scratch kitchen" is a useful requirement; "10 years of culinary experience" is not. Name the cuisine only if it's actually essential. |
| Schedule and hours | Not a requirement, but the reason chefs leave. State the days, approximate hours, days off and holidays honestly; "must be flexible" is read as "60 hours and no consecutive days off." |
| Cost management | Legitimate and under-asked. Ask what food-cost and labor percentages they ran and how; it separates chefs from cooks with a title. |
| Physical requirements | Heat, standing, lifting, long shifts. Include them; chefs expect them. |
| Work authorization and background check | State them plainly; don't make them pre-application steps. |
| Résumé, portfolio, tasting | A tasting or stage is a reasonable final step. A résumé and cover letter are not needed to start the conversation — name, phone, three questions and a call. |
How to customize it for your setting
Independent restaurant (head chef)
Concept, covers, menu ownership, the owner relationship, and the schedule. Independents compete on creative control and days off; say what the chef gets to decide.
Hotel, club and resort (executive chef)
Outlets, banquet volume, the size of the brigade, the P&L, and the benefits — hotels win on benefits, bonus and stability. Lead with the numbers.
Senior living, healthcare and institutional dining
Fixed hours, no late nights, holidays covered by rotation, dietary and regulatory requirements. This is the posting that draws chefs leaving restaurant hours; lead with the schedule. See senior living staffing.
Sous chef and kitchen manager
Separate postings: the sous chef posting should describe the chef they'll work under and the path up; the kitchen manager posting should describe the systems and the volume. Both compete with line-cook pay plus overtime, so state the salary and hours together. The broader frontline picture is on our frontline recruiting page.
What it costs to reach chefs and cooks on social
Our 2026 Social Job Advertising Benchmark doesn't break out restaurant and kitchen roles as their own family, so the honest reference is the overall picture: across 891 campaigns the median campaign cost $13.88 per applicant, the volume-weighted average was $8.02, and half of all campaigns landed between $6.48 and $29.74. Management and professional roles — the closest family for a head or executive chef posting — ran a $16.87 median with a wide middle band of $4.62 to $60.11 and 16% application completion.
Two things transfer directly from that data to kitchen hiring. First, cost is driven by completion, not attention: a chef posting that asks for a résumé and a portfolio before a phone call sits at the top of the band, and one that asks three questions sits at the bottom. Second, reach matters more for chefs than for cooks — nearly every working chef is employed, few are on job boards, and all of them are in the feed. The mechanics of a first campaign are on our social media job advertising page.
Writing the ad version
The ad is not the job description. It answers rung, pay, schedule and kitchen in the first two lines: "Head chef — $75–$90K + quarterly bonus, five days, two consecutive days off, closed Mondays, fully staffed team of 8, scratch Italian, 120 seats. [Restaurant], [City]. Apply in 60 seconds." Knockout questions: current or most recent title (multiple choice), years at sous chef or above, food safety manager certification (yes/no), start date. No résumé, no portfolio.
A 15-second video of the line during service with the owner or the outgoing chef saying what the job actually is beats any stock photo of a plated dish. Chefs talk to each other about which kitchens are staffed and which owners are decent; a specific, honest posting gets forwarded.
Frequently asked questions
What are the duties and responsibilities of a chef?
Planning, costing and executing the menu; ordering and managing inventory to a food-cost target; hiring, training, scheduling and leading the kitchen team; running service and checking every plate; maintaining food safety and health department compliance; tracking food and labor costs against budget; maintaining equipment; and coordinating with the front of house and events.
What is the difference between a chef and a cook?
A cook prepares food on a station under direction. A chef runs the kitchen: the menu, the purchasing, the cost, the schedule and the people, and usually cooks as well. Within chefs, an executive chef oversees multiple outlets or a large operation, a head chef or chef de cuisine runs one kitchen, and a sous chef is the second in command.
What qualifications does a chef need?
No license. Most jurisdictions require a certified food protection manager (ServSafe Manager or an equivalent) on staff. Employers look for years of progressive kitchen experience — typically sous chef or above in a comparable kitchen — plus demonstrated cost, inventory and scheduling management. A culinary degree is preferred by some employers but not required.
How much do chefs make?
The 2025 national median for chefs and head cooks was $30.03 an hour, or $62,470 a year, per O*NET/BLS. Executive chefs at hotels, clubs and larger operations, and chefs in high-cost metros, earn substantially more; sous chefs and kitchen managers typically earn less than the median.
What should a chef job description template include?
The rung (executive, head, sous, kitchen manager), the concept and volume (seats, covers), the size of the team and whether it's fully staffed, salary range and bonus structure, the schedule with days off and holidays, what the chef owns (menu, ordering, hiring), the systems used, certification requirements, physical requirements, and benefits. Rung, pay and schedule belong in the first two lines.
Pay, employment and outlook figures: O*NET OnLine (Chefs and Head Cooks, 35-1011), 2025 wage data, and the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics Occupational Outlook Handbook, 2024–34 projections. Food protection manager requirements per the FDA Food Code and state and local health codes. Cost-per-applicant figures: Boostpoint 2026 Social Job Advertising Benchmark (all campaigns; management/professional role family). Last updated August 2026.