Chef Qualifications and Skills: What do I need to Know to Become a Chef?
Any person who loves cooking has probably thought about a career as a high-end chef. But becoming a chef is not all about cooking. A chef will also supervise the kitchen staff, choose and order ingredients, control spending, plan the menu, and handle any other food-related issues relating to the kitchen. The road to becoming a chef requires countless hours in the kitchen and you need more than raw talent to reach the upper ranks of the profession.
Qualities and Skills You Need to be a Successful Chef
To be a successful chef, there are numerous qualities you will need to have or cultivate, including:
- Stress management: The position of a chef can be nerve-wracking, and you’ll need to understand how to manage that stress without letting it burn you out. There are many ways to handle your stress in the kitchen, but having a naturally even temperament goes a long way in ensuring that.
- Multitasking: You need to be able to pay attention to multiple tasks at the same time, from remembering the dishes ordered by guests to cooking several dishes together.
- Communication: Communication is one of the most important tools for chefs. You must be able to engage with the front of the house, share information with fellow chefs, and communicate adjustments to workflows and recipes.
- Dexterity: Your manual dexterity can prove useful in the kitchen when doing intricate chopping and handling different instruments.
- Attention to Detail: A chef needs to be precise in ordering food products, measuring the ingredients or figuring out what time to cook certain food items.
- Cleanliness: You need to know how to keep the kitchen clean because unsanitary conditions can affect the quality of food, your reputation, and can even force a restaurant to shut down.
- Organization: Since chefs have to often multitask and work with different items at once, keeping the kitchen organized is a must, enforcing order in an environment that is naturally chaotic.
- Creativity: Chefs must have the imagination and creativity that will keep customers back. This means being open to trying new food items and improving older recipes.
Importance of Education to Becoming a Chef
While formal education is not a requirement to become a chef, degree programs can offer specialized knowledge and skills that serve students in good stead when learning their work. At its core, a culinary arts program should equip you with knowledge and skills required to be a chef who knows how to cook, keep the kitchen safe, create new dishes, and run the kitchen efficiently. In addition to learning culinary arts, formal education can help improve your skills and satisfy your customers.
Not convinced? Here are a few of the reasons formal education is crucial for chefs:
Develop Time Management and Leadership Skills
Professional kitchens are incredibly unforgiving environments with demanding mental and physical labor, short deadlines, and long hours. As they progress in their culinary education, students are able to develop leadership and time management skills, as well as a sense of collaboration to help them deal with the demands of this profession. Students also learn leadership skills throughout their classes.
Appreciate Different Cultures
Culinary school gives you the opportunity to appreciate different cultures and experience things outside the restaurant. This, in turn, helps you build empathy for people and spread an appreciation for different styles of cooking to your customers.
Understand Nutritional Science
Understanding how to perfectly cook a dish and bring together many unique flavors is vital. As a culinary student, you’ll gain strong knowledge of food sources, nutrients, and the ability of the human body to process them. This can help you see ingredients as more than pieces in a puzzle, but rather building blocks from which you can develop entirely new creations. From developing alternatives for individuals who are allergic to certain foods to creating nutritionally dense meals, this aspect of being a chef can’t be ignored.
Learn Concepts of Math and Accounting
The ability to manage resources and funds is highly vital for the success of a restaurant. Failure to control spending, make proper orders, properly price out a menu, or manage inventory can create a barrier for a chef to advance professionally. Through the culinary arts program, students learn the concepts of accounting and business math and how they apply in the hospitality field.
Are you interested in becoming a professional chef?
If you want to earn an Associate of Applied Science Degree in Culinary Arts, consider ECPI University's Culinary Institute of Virginia. For more information on our accelerated programs, connect with a friendly admissions advisor today.
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