Okay, you’ve completed your courses at a top culinary school and walked away with certification as a trained cook or chef at some level. That culinary degree is your ticket in the door somewhere; the question is where. One of the elements in the culinary industry that should be a key factor in your job search is the fact that there is a high turnover rate of employees at all levels.

That…

The term “culinary industry” is a very broad umbrella. The U.S. Labor Department’s Bureau of Labor Statistics concentrates on chefs and cooks of various types, along with food preparation workers of many types. However catering managers and restaurant managers can easily fall into the category of culinary professional; indeed, many trained cooks and chefs do take on management roles or open their own restaurants.

Their statistics for these categories, however,…

The truth is that every area in the culinary industry is going to grow. Some areas are going to grow faster than others, but two trends establish the fact that a degree from a culinary school is an investment in the future. One is that people are eating out more often; going to full service restaurants, take out windows and everything in between. The other reason is that the…

Actually, these are issues that probably do come up for discussion during the course of a culinary school education; it’s just that there is no formal educational preparation for them. That’s because what is required is internally generated abilities: situations and instances where you will need to bring forth your strongest emotional and intellectual discipline.

1. The food service establishment with three generations (or more) of tradition. What we’re referring…

For generations, people in the food service business generally worked their way up through the ranks. The highest quality restaurants had chefs who trained at one of the three or four big-name culinary academies, but most of the rest of the industry relied on people whose principal education came through experience.

That is no longer the case. There are now over two hundred certified culinary schools turning out graduates with…