Chef Resume
A chef resume is read for three things: whether you can run a station through a full service, whether you can keep food cost in line, and whether you can be trusted with the prep list and the health inspection. Head chefs and sous chefs screen for volume — covers per service, ticket times, banquet counts — plus certifications and the stations you can run. The same page has to work for a line cook role, where speed and station range matter more than menu development. A complete sample appears below, alongside the parts kitchen managers care about, and a layout that keeps the page readable.
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What a chef resume must include
- A standard title the kitchen recognizes — “Line Cook,” “Chef de Partie,” “Sous Chef,” or “Chef.” Invented titles such as “Culinary Artist” often fail to match the posting.
- Certification status near the top: ServSafe Food Protection Manager or the local food manager credential, with the issuing body and expiration date. Many states require a certified manager on site during service.
- A headline naming your stations and volume: “Sauté and grill, 300-cover dinner service,” or “Pastry, hotel banquet kitchen.”
- A summary with two or three hard numbers — covers per service, food cost percentage, ticket times — plus the kind of kitchen you worked.
- Each bullet should move from result to action to service volume. “Held food cost at 28.6% against a 30% target by re-costing every plate on the spring menu” says more than “controlled food cost.”
- Availability stated plainly. Kitchens run nights, weekends, and holidays, and the availability line is part of the screening.
Kitchen hiring often starts with a phone screen and a working stage. The resume's job is to get you the stage: specific kitchens, specific stations, specific numbers.
Chef Resume Example
Example resume
A one-page chef resume with food cost, covers per service, and station details — the same structure our builder produces.
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Recommended sections for a chef resume
- Certifications — near the top, with the program name, issuing body, and expiration date.
- Summary — short; lead with your best volume or food cost number.
- Experience — reverse-chronological, with kitchen type, stations, and covers per service for each role.
- Skills — grouped by certifications, stations, menu and cost, and safety.
- Education — last and shortest; culinary school helps but does not replace station experience.
Chef skills and keywords
Echo the kitchen posting's language wherever it honestly describes your cooking. Station names, certification names, and cost terms are the words most often matched. If you have never run a station the posting lists, name the stations you have run from prep to close rather than claiming one you have not.
- Certifications: ServSafe Food Protection Manager, state food handler card, allergen awareness, TIPS, CPR
- Stations: grill, sauté, fry, garde manger, pastry, expo, opening and closing
- Menu and cost: recipe development, recipe costing, portioning, yield testing, food cost percentage, menu changes
- Volume: covers per service, banquet counts, ticket times, high-volume plating, brunch service
- Safety: HACCP, temperature logs, cooling and holding, cross-contamination, chemical safety, knife handling
- Operations: inventory, ordering, receiving, scheduling, training, health inspection readiness
ATS tips for chef resumes
- Spell out your food manager credential inside the resume body, not just at the top. Name the program and the expiration date, because managers verify these.
- Use the posting's title. “Line Cook” and “Prep Cook” are not interchangeable in every system, so match the wording of the posting.
- Keep the layout single-column. Divided columns confuse parsers, and whole sections can go missing.
- Spell terms out once — “hazard analysis and critical control points (HACCP)” — because systems tokenize abbreviations differently.
- Name the shifts you can work in plain wording near the top. Kitchens schedule around brunch, dinner, and doubles, and the line is read as a hiring signal.
- Contact fields should be plain text; tables, icons, and graphics can misparse them.
Most kitchens still read resumes quickly, but larger groups and hotel operators run applications through the same systems as the rest of the company. A resume that parses cleanly and names its certifications and stations moves to the next step.
Common chef resume mistakes
- Naming a title the kitchen does not use. “Kitchen Rockstar” does not match a posting for “Line Cook,” and the match is done by software first.
- Claiming a station you have not run. A stage on the line exposes the gap in the first hour; list the stations you can run from prep to close.
- Writing duties with no scale. “Prepared food” says nothing; “plated 300 covers on the sauté station with a 12-minute ticket time” says everything.
- Leaving off the food manager certification date. Inspections and insurance often require a current credentialed manager on site.
- Blurring the timeline. Kitchen work is often seasonal or short; label those roles with dates and keep the recent, longer roles detailed.
A kitchen hires on the stage, but the resume decides who gets one — and the numbers on it have to reach the reader in one piece. ShitResume runs every template on a single linear document, keeping the ServSafe credential, the station list and the food-cost figure in the same order on screen, in the parser and in the exported PDF or DOCX. There is no charge and no account to open first.
Nothing about ShitResume costs money — not the templates, not the exports, not the PDF. Your food cost percentages, station sign-offs and inspection record are processed locally in the browser, so they stay in the kitchen with you rather than on a server. No account stands between you and the file. Type it once the dinner rush ends; there is nothing to renew on this side.
Skills and keywords for this role
Use the terms that genuinely describe your work — an interviewer will ask about anything you list.
- Certifications: ServSafe Food Protection Manager, state food handler card, allergen awareness, TIPS or alcohol server training where the kitchen serves, CPR and first aid in some operations
- Stations: grill, sauté, fry, garde manger, pastry, expo; opening and closing the line; station setup, prep lists, and breakdown
- Menu and cost: recipe development, recipe costing and portioning, yield testing, food cost percentage, seasonal specials, menu changes
- Volume: covers per service, banquet and catering counts, ticket times, high-volume plating, working a double, weekend brunch service
- Safety and sanitation: HACCP, temperature and cooling logs, holding standards, cross-contamination control, chemical safety, knife handling, walk-in organization
- Kitchen operations: inventory and ordering, vendor receiving, staff scheduling, training new cooks, health inspection readiness, equipment maintenance
Frequently asked questions
Do I need ServSafe or another certification on a chef resume?
A food manager credential such as ServSafe Food Protection Manager is expected for sous chef and chef roles in most US kitchens, and many states require at least one certified manager on site during service. Line cook postings often ask only for a food handler card. Put the program name, issuing body, and expiration date near the top of the resume, and renew before it lapses — an expired card is not a credential.
What numbers should a chef resume include?
Covers per service, food cost percentage, ticket times, and banquet counts are the numbers kitchen managers read first, so use the figures you can explain and show how you influenced them. Re-costing a menu, changing portioning, or rebuilding a prep list are all actions that move those numbers. If your kitchen never shared figures, describe scale instead — the size of the line, the stations you ran, the plates on a busy night. Never invent a percentage you cannot defend.
How do I write a chef resume with no culinary school?
Lead with station experience and certifications. Cooking school helps for fine dining and pastry, but most kitchens hire on the line: name the stations you can run, the volume you have handled, and the food safety training you hold. Start with prep or garde manger where you can, and document each station sign-off as you earn it so the resume grows with you.
Should I list every dish or recipe I know on a chef resume?
No. Name the cuisines and stations you know well, and mention two or three dishes you developed if they were yours. Space is better spent on volume, food cost, and certifications, because a stage tests cooking faster than a list ever could.
How long should a chef resume be?
One page for line cooks and most chef de partie roles. Two pages are reasonable for sous chef, executive chef, and multi-unit roles that need to show menu development, scheduling, and cost management. Keep older or unrelated roles to one line each, and let the recent kitchens carry the detail.
How do I show menu development on a chef resume?
Name the result, the action, and the scale: “Developed 6 seasonal specials a month, two of which stayed on the menu as top sellers.” Add cost and margin where you know them, and say whether you owned the recipe, the costing, or both. Menu work that never made it to the line is still worth a line if you can describe what you tested and why it was cut.