Executive Chef Skills – It’s Not Just About Cooking
Becoming an executive chef requires a lot of training and experience; however, there are also many natural skills that are necessary to become an executive chef. Some of these skills can be improved upon during chef training in a reputable culinary arts school; therefore, it is important to select your culinary degree carefully to ensure your training curriculum will meet all your requirements.
Overview of Executive Chef Skills
- Love and Knowledge of Cooking – This is the most obvious skill that you must have. If you don’t have a true passion for cooking, you will surely never make it. Chef training from a reputable chef school will cover all the basics of food preparation and the different techniques required to produce appetizing food, but a love of cooking is what distinguishes a real chef.
- Sharp Sense of Taste and Smell – Chefs, especially those who go on to become sous-chefs or head chefs, will require the training they learned in culinary college but must also have natural talents of being able to taste and smell food properly. This will help with menu planning and meal creation.
- Originality and Creativity – An important aspect of being an executive chef is meeting the challenging of coming up with new and innovative culinary creations. An original yet still appetizing dish will go far towards becoming a chef and impressing restaurant critics. Truly great chefs treat their craft as an art.
- Safety and Sanitation Skills – It is imperative that chefs understand the importance of keeping a kitchen clean and safe. This requires common sense as well as knowledge of how to use industrial kitchen equipment safely. Chef schools and culinary colleges will all cover these basics in their core curriculum.
- High Degree of Professionalism – Having to deal with vendors, clients, restaurant managers, and V.I.P.s makes it essential for chefs of all levels, especially executive chefs, to have a high degree of professionalism.
- Good Communication Skills – For a kitchen to run smoothly and meals to be served in a timely manner, it is necessary for all the chefs to communicate well. This involves acknowledging receipt of orders and instructions as well as giving them clearly.
- Ability to Take Direction – While executive chefs tend to give the orders, it is important to be able to take direction when appropriate. Maintaining a humble spirit will help you listen to the restaurant owner and even other kitchen staff. The prima donna that has to have it their way will most likely have a life of moving from one job to another because they simply can’t take direction.
- Ability to Supervise – Moving up the ranks to a position of executive chef will come with the added responsibility of having to supervise the chefs and kitchen assistants. You must be able to do this by giving clear instructions and acting as a mentor for those with less experience than yourself. If you rule the kitchen like a tyrant, you will be forced to deal with constant staff turnover which in the long run will hurt the quality of the food that your kitchen puts out.
- Ability to Be a Team Player – Whatever your position in a working kitchen, you will need to be a productive member of the team, willing to help out with a variety of different tasks depending on what is needed of you at the time.
These are the basic skills required to be a successful executive chef. To be a cook in a fast food chain or a local restaurant you may not require them all, but not only will these skills make your job more enjoyable, but it will also make it easier for the kitchen to work a team. Your skill set will grow and change with the more experience you gain, and you will then find that courses in business management, employee relations, and mathematics become more useful than culinary techniques. On top of these skills, employers will also check to make sure you have an up-to-date health certificate stating that you are free from communicable diseases.
As you can see, there is much more to being a successful chef than meets the eye. Practice honing all of these skills and you will certainly be a top executive chef.