Chef CV Examples & Writing Guide

This sample is for a sous chef with about ten years in kitchens who started as a commis chef, ran a section as chef de partie in a busy hotel restaurant and is now sous chef at an independent restaurant. The name and restaurants are made up. Keep the structure and swap in your own kitchens, covers and numbers.

Chef hiring is done by chefs and owners, not HR, and many of them read a CV in the 30 seconds between lunch and prep. Four things carry the decision.

• Where you have cooked. Cuisine, restaurant type (fine dining, hotel, gastropub, casual, contract catering), seats and covers a night. Fine dining and 400-cover banqueting kitchens are different jobs and both are valuable; the chef wants to know which you have done.
• Your rank and section. Kitchen porter, commis, chef de partie (which section), sous, head or executive chef. Say what you actually ran. Chefs check references inside the industry, and kitchens are small.
• Numbers that show you understand the business. Food cost or GP, labour cost, waste, ordering budget, covers per chef. A commis does not need these; a sous chef or above does.
• Food safety. UK law requires everyone handling food to be trained or supervised in food hygiene to suit their work; kitchens expect Level 2 from every chef and Level 3 from sous chefs and above, plus allergen training. A food hygiene rating of 5 at your kitchens proves you run a clean kitchen.

“I want to see covers, stations and how long they stayed. Someone who did two years on sauté in a 300-cover hotel kitchen can work my line. Someone whose CV says 'passionate about food' and lists six kitchens in three years cannot, and I know why they left each one.”

Three or four lines under your name: rank and years, the kind of kitchens, covers and brigade size, one or two business numbers, and your food safety level. Below are versions for the ranks people search for most.

Most chef CVs read like a list of duties: "prepared dishes, maintained cleanliness, assisted the head chef." The chef hiring you knows the duties. What they want is the scale and the result. Eight rewrites below use real kitchen work.

A skills list on a chef CV should read like an inventory of what you can do, not a personality profile. Keep 10–14 items, match the advert's words, and let your rank set the mix of technique and management.

Cooking and technique (all ranks):

• Sections you have run: sauce, grill, fish, larder (garde manger), veg, pastry, the pass
• Knife skills, butchery and fish preparation
• Classical technique: stocks, mother sauces, braising, roasting, emulsions
• Cuisines you cook at a professional level (name them; do not list six)
• Baking and pastry: bread, laminated doughs, plated desserts, chocolate, sugar work
• Volume: covers per night, banqueting size, à la carte vs. set menu
• Dietary and allergen cooking (gluten-free, vegan, the 14 allergens, allergen matrices)

Kitchen management (sous chef and above):

• Menu development and recipe costing
• Food cost, GP, labour cost and P&L basics
• Ordering, stock and supplier management (name the software: Procure Wizard, Apicbase, Nory, or your spreadsheets)
• Rotas and training for a brigade (give the size)
• HACCP or Safer Food, Better Business, food hygiene inspections and temperature records
• Kitchen openings, equipment purchasing and layout
• EPOS and kitchen display systems: Toast, Lightspeed, Zonal, Micros

Leave out "passion for food" and "works well under pressure." Every chef says it. Covers per night and ticket times prove the pressure part.

Cooking has no licence, but food safety law applies to every kitchen, and a few qualifications carry weight. List them in their own section with the awarding body or provider and the year.

• Food safety: UK law requires food handlers to be supervised and instructed or trained in food hygiene to suit their work, rather than naming one certificate. In practice kitchens expect Level 2 Food Safety and Hygiene for Catering from every chef and Level 3 Supervising Food Safety from sous chefs and above; head chefs often add Level 4 and a HACCP award. List the level, awarding body and year.
• Allergen training covering the 14 allergens and Natasha's Law labelling for prepacked for direct sale (PPDS) food: expected everywhere and essential if you write menus or allergen matrices.
• Cookery qualifications and apprenticeships: an NVQ or Level 2–3 Diploma in Professional Cookery, or a commis chef (Level 2), chef de partie (Level 3) or senior culinary chef apprenticeship. Not required, but recognised in hotels, contract catering and larger groups.
• College: a full-time professional cookery course or culinary arts degree helps at the entry level and for hotel jobs. After five years, the kitchens you have worked in matter more.
• Stages, competitions and press: a stage (a short trial placement) at a notable restaurant, a competition medal or a menu reviewed by a guide can go in a short "Additional" section. Keep it to facts.

UK chefs often list a restaurant's Michelin stars, AA Rosettes or guide entries next to the employer; say what the kitchen held while you were there, and still give the restaurant type, seats and covers. In the US the same document is called a resume.

Kitchens hire kitchen porters and commis chefs every week and promote from within, which is how most chefs started. A first kitchen CV needs to show that you can work fast and clean, take direction, stand for ten hours and learn. College helps but is not required, and an apprenticeship lets you train while you are paid.

1. 1Header title: "Commis Chef", "Kitchen Porter" or "Trainee Chef", whatever matches the advert. Do not write "Chef" until a kitchen has called you one.
2. 2Two-line career objective: what you can already do (knife skills, a cuisine you cook at home in volume, a college course) and the hours you can work (nights, weekends, bank holidays).
3. 3Get Level 2 Food Hygiene before you apply. It costs little, takes a few hours online and appears on most adverts.
4. 4List your college course with the techniques covered and any work placements. A 12-week placement in a real restaurant is experience; write it as a job with covers and sections.
5. 5Any fast, physical, customer-facing job counts: kitchen porter, fast food, barista, catering assistant, supermarket deli. Give the volume and your attendance.
6. 6Home cooking counts only if it was in volume or for others: cooking for a family of eight, a community lunch for 100, a pop-up or market stall. Give numbers.
7. 7One page, PDF. Ask for a trial shift in your covering note; chefs hire off a trial more than off a CV.

• One page for commis chefs up to sous chefs. Two pages only for head and executive chefs with openings, multiple sites or a long list of properties.
• Order: header with rank, personal statement, experience, skills, qualifications, education. Experience goes above skills here because chefs read the kitchens first.
• For each kitchen give the restaurant type, seats or covers and your section or rank in the first bullet or the company line. "Sauce section, 300 covers" says more than any adjective.
• Reverse chronological with months. Chefs know the industry moves, but six kitchens in three years still needs a reason (seasonal, opening team, relocation). A one-line note is fine.
• Stages and short placements go in a separate line or section so they do not look like jobs you left after two weeks.
• No photo, no date of birth. A link to a food Instagram or portfolio is fine if the photos are of your food and it is current.

Send a PDF. The cvplex chef template used in the sample puts skills and qualifications beside the experience, reads well on a phone between services and still parses in the applicant tracking systems hotel groups use.

Independent restaurants read CVs by hand. Hotel groups, restaurant groups, cruise lines and contract caterers use applicant tracking software that matches the advert's words. When applying to those, mirror the advert.

• Titles as advertised: commis chef, demi chef de partie, chef de partie, junior sous chef, sous chef, head chef, executive chef, pastry chef, banqueting chef, kitchen porter
• Kitchen words: covers, à la carte, banqueting, brigade, mise en place, the pass, recipe costing, food cost, GP, labour cost, stock control, ordering
• Safety words: Level 2 / Level 3 Food Hygiene, HACCP, allergens, Natasha's Law, food hygiene rating, temperature records, COSHH
• Cuisine and technique words the advert uses (modern British, French, Italian, Japanese, seasonal, butchery, pastry, bread)
• Software: Toast, Micros, Zonal, Procure Wizard, Fourth (rotas, stock and recipes in many hotel and restaurant groups)