r/Chefs

I used to run a restaurant, and one thing that always frustrated me was kitchen timers. We needed 10+ timers running at once, they took up space, were hard to see/hear, and seemed to constantly break — meaning we were buying replacements again and again.

So I built my own multi-timer app, designed specifically for my kitchen.

The idea was simple: high contrast, easy to see, easy to hear, colour-coded timers, and no unnecessary clutter. It made keeping track of multiple deep fries much easier.

Now I'm curious what other commercial cooks would want from an app like this.

For example:

• Would you want timers colour-coded by station or dish?
• Different sounds for different timers?
• A timer you can see from across the kitchen?
• Voice controls so you don't have to touch your phone?
• Preset timers for common dishes?
• Multiple orders/timers grouped together?
• Something completely different?

If you work in a commercial kitchen, what little problem do you wish an app could solve during a busy service?

It doesn't have to be complicated — I'd actually love to hear the simplest ideas. What would make your day in the kitchen just a little easier?

I’ve always felt DoorDash and other takeout gives marginally less food. Anyone do this on purpose? Why? Not that I wouldn’t do the same lol but just wondering

Starting at the bottom washing dishes. In my 30s. No education but I do love cooking/eating/serving/hospitality. I have another gig based job that pays well per job and has allowed me to travel a ton so I am trying to take this opportunity to learn and possibly change careers for something more steady/in town.

I'm a few weeks in and don't want to take any short cuts but I'm not interested in paying for education. I know this is sacrilege but my dream is to one day run my own breakfast service.

Anyway, I'm just looking for some advice on how to maximize my time in the restaurant and learn from chefs without insulting their time/effort that they have put into the work. I want to learn but I feel awkward asking for training when a lot of these people have student debt and have been doing this for a long time. Some are so talented and much younger than me. How would (or how did) you approach this?

They've put me on some basic food prep already which was a nice change from dishes but I feel like I'm in the deep end of the pool with Olympic swimmers and I'm wearing floaties. Just trying to make sure I'm doing a good job.

Thanks

I work at a small Italian restaurant right now, and I’m getting to the point where I’m seriously considering leaving and trying to get hired somewhere else as a sous chef.

A big reason is the way the kitchen is managed. Other cooks constantly leave things unprepped, but the head chef never addresses it or disciplines anyone unless it directly affects him. Meanwhile, I feel like I get singled out over things like putting the truck away and other stuff of that nature. The kitchen has been pretty dysfunctional lately. We’re constantly dealing with communication and prep issues. For example, the other night we had a 20-top and only 15 chicken portions prepped, so we had to improvise just to get through the party. We ended up selling out of broccolini, chicken parm, and calamari. None it was on the prep list for the morning (which the head chef made the night before mind you, knowing we had that 20 top for dinner). None of that was prepped afterward because we were slammed cooking for the party and the rest of the dining room.

The sous and head chef apparently got into an argument about it afterward. Today, I came in and the chef had thrown away food I personally had packed and stored in the walk-in. He claimed he didn’t know whose it was because it wasn't labeled, but considering the timing and the fact that he moved another employee's food instead of throwing it away, it felt pretty passive-aggressive.

Stuff like this is becoming exhausting, but my bigger issue is that I don't feel like I'm growing here anymore. The restaurant isn't consistently busy enough for me to really develop under pressure, and we can only seat 150 max. I’ve already taken on a lot of responsibilities beyond just working my station. I've overseen the line when the chef wasn't there, made daily prep lists for line/prep cooks, handled inventory, stocked and rotated deliveries, filled whatever station needed covered when someone called out, and generally helped keep service
running.

At this point, I feel like I'm doing a lot of what a sous chef does without really getting the title or opportunity that comes with it.
So for chefs/managers here: **how would you market this experience when applying for sous chef positions?**
I'm confident in my ability to learn quickly and run a line, but I also don't want to walk into an interview pretending I have experience I don't have. I'm basically trying to figure out how to turn the experience I'm already getting into an actual sous position somewhere better.

It’s often fun to connect and stay in touch with fellow chefs, it’s a worthwhile idea to follow each other. Don’t you think? In my humble opinion, chefs are the real celebrities 🥂

Drop your usernames 🙌🏼

My husband is a chef and works as a CDC for a well known restaurant in our small town. He wants to offer private chef services for AirBnBs but doesn’t know where to start (nor does he know how Reddit works lol).

There are currently no chef services being offered in our town via AirBnB. Does anyone have experience getting onto AirBnB, or are there other popular experience websites you’d recommend?

Thanks!

Edit: He is looking into AirBnB so he can make some extra cash without being overly shared on social media and drawing attention away from his restaurant.

I have a beautiful ethnic restaurant with decent food and lots of potential, it was built with love and passion alone! No Pryor experience in the business, i mean literally zero experience, i have never worked in one and what i do for a living has nothing to do with a restaurant, i love food, and im a passionate cook!

THE PROBLEMS.

In order to do it i sold a house and got a mortgage on the house i live in. It has affected my family negatively, I went back to my old work in order to bring some income to support my family. My adult kid is suffering by being there all the time. Im broke all the time.

The place is relatively busy, but by not knowing the business, whatever potential profits I should have are wasted with my mismanagement in every level.

Schedule to minimize payroll , food cost , food portions, menu items and pricing , food waste, whatever is a mistake im doing it, but I do not know how to fix it because I dont have the experience and im guessing all the time.

Im afraid to raise prices and im second guessing myself because I dont know if its the right thing since im lacking the experience in everything that is problematic with the fear that I will worsen the situation.

MY GREAT IDEA BEFORE I FALL ON MY SWORD

find a chef that knows his shit and give him absolute control in order to create profitability (the place is relatively busy everything is there for success including the costumers!)

GIVE THE CHEF A PERCENTAGE OF OWNERSHIP

How do I structure this?

Is it stupid?

Should I just give up (it will ruin me financially)

With my new job I dont need a penny from the restaurant, I provide for my family.

Genuine question for people in food/hospitality because I might be looking at this completely wrong.

I came across a chef/hospitality WhatsApp group charging ₹100 to join. There are 276 people in it, so that’s ₹27,600 if everyone has paid.

The reason given for the fee is that it shows people are serious and have the “right intent.”

I questioned that because paying ₹100 doesn’t really tell you whether someone will contribute anything. It just tells you they were willing to pay ₹100.

I also pointed out that a lot of the communication around the group reads like it was written by AI, which I find pretty ironic for a community supposedly centred around real chefs and real industry conversations.

I was told I couldn’t really judge the group because I hadn’t experienced it.

Fair enough. So I paid the ₹100, intending to join, see what it’s actually like and then make up my mind.

Then I was told I couldn’t be let in because I was joining specifically to see whether the community was actually worth it, rather than because I already believed in the idea.

So I’m genuinely confused.

I’m not allowed to judge it because I haven’t been inside, but I’m also not allowed inside because I want to judge it.

And I still haven’t got my ₹100 back. 🤣

Maybe this is just one weird example. But I’m increasingly uncomfortable with the direction of the chef community: AI generated voices, paywalled networking, monetised access to people, and “community” becoming another product to sell.

Chefs already have something far more valuable than this: actual knowledge, actual work, actual relationships and actual kitchens.

Are we really going to start putting a price tag and an AI wrapper around that too?

Genuinely curious where other chefs draw the line.

I've been considering applying for this program, it's only 6 months and it won't put me in debt. I've seen a lot on reddit about CIA, but not a peep about the accelerated program. Anyone got any insights? How does it compare to the associates/bachelors programs?

Edit: thanks to all who have responded! Adding a bit of background on myself, I’ve been in the industry for 4 years now. When I first started I had considered culinary school, but took the prevailing advice to start with industry experience. Well here I am 4 years later and I think I made the right choice back then, but can’t help but still be curious about a formal culinary education. This particular program interests me because it’s only a 6 month commitment and the potential connections I could make could help me get into fine dining which is where I plan on going next. so if anyone has taken part in this specific program I’d love to hear your experiences!

I'm an exec sous chef for one of the major streaming services, based in LA. I'm curious how many other people in this same line of work are pulling 15-16 hour days, back to back to back? It's nice having a Monday through Friday schedule but damn, with the amount of hours I'm pulling and driving around on my own dime, I feel like it's not feeling as lucrative as it sounded on paper.

Hi Everyone,

I’m posting this in hopes to maybe some good information, i’ve been working in the food service industry for a couple years now and it’s my passion. Unfortunately burnout got me and completely shut down my nervous system resulting in health issues i’m still dealing with and i had to leave my job. BUT i still need to pay my bills haha. Is there such thing as a work from home style food industry job?! I have experience in everything from management/leading. Costing/R&D Menu planning and training. This is what i know how to do best and I don’t particularly want to do something else that 1. i don’t know what im doing 2. isn’t at least a little fulfilling. If someone could steer me into any helpful direction or has any connections they would be gladly appreciated! Thank you :)

Hello, I've been in the industry since I was 17 (36 now) and been an executive chef since I was 23. I have 0 passion left in the tank. I work 50-60 hours a week not including the work I do from home (I'm on salary) and still live paycheck to paycheck. This was fine when it was just me but I'm missing out on my kid growing up and it has almost ruined my relationship with my wife. I live in Michigan about 1 hour from Detroit and 15 min from Flint. I have been searching for a way out but I can't find an entry level job that pays my low salary now. I've talked to food reps about changing over to a food rep and they warn me to stay away. Does anyone have any ideas on a career path I can take. Thank you in advance

Hey chefs is there a trimming of food scraps that you save from food prep that you actually prefer that often gets scrapped. Myself I like the very end of an onion after trimming off just the root. I think that has the best flavor of the whole rest of the onion. Also bone marrow is great. Any other suggestions?

I've been looking for kitchen porter roles last month or so and havent really come across much. Does anyone do this/having tips to getting part time work in this sector?

I interviewed for a Kitchen Manager position and was invited to a 3-hour skills assessment at the restaurant tomorrow. They said I’ll get to see how they operate and try some of the food.
For anyone who’s done one of these before, what should I expect and what would you recommend I focus on?

Just to start this off there are 3 categories of cooking.

1. Heat

2. Pressure

3. Acid

Now to clear it all up:

1. Mayonnaise/aoili IS a mother sauce, as the egg is cooked with acid from either lemon juice or Dijon mustard (both of which being high acid components to cure the egg)

1B. Hollandaise, categorically different from Mayonnaise/aioli due to the inclusion of a liquid part reduction and the necessity of heat

2. Tomato, no further explanation required.

3. Espagniol (Sp?) Your basic pan sauce building fond and deglazing, sometimes with the inclusion of flour but always including fat

4. Veloute: fortified stock plus the inclusion of roux, commonly recognized as "Gravy" truly a staple in American cuisine.

5. Demiglace. Built purely off of collagen in the stock used for the reduction and the inclusion of reduced wine to mount in sugars to truly create the body of the sauce.

(Honorable mentions): beurre blanc. Can't be made more simply than its base components and widely utilized and extremely versatile in its execution and flavoring based on the chef at hand. You could also include a beurre Roche for the same reasons.

Gastrique/Ridurre: also cannot be made more basic than its core components but is widely utilized and many other sauces branch from this base.

If anyone would like to critique or add please do, I have almost 2 decades of experience with various restaurants and concepts, a culinary degree, and this is my brand of autism. I'd love to let you know how whatever you post fits into one of these categories.

Footer: im tired of seeing new/fledgling/"creatives" try to break Escoffier's life work down to fit their purview. All of what I've listed is facts backed up by tried and true chefs over centuries. This sub needs a control post to cut out the new heads/part timers who think they are able to reinvent the wheel. (Which id say is more established than the wheel itself.)

Scrapping, refining, reposting tomorrow. Thanks to the "chefs" who tried to "help" and thank you very much to the actual chefs who pointed out my gaps. Regardless this sub needs a definitive post of mother sauces and I will put in more effort in the repost.

Do we consider Mayonnaise as a mother sauce or not or do i just consider Hollandaise Béchamel Veloute Espagnole and Tomato as mother sauces??

I’m 27 and currently working as a CDP on an hourly rate. I work overtime pretty much every day, and with OT I average around **$84k a year**.
I was recently offered a **Sous Chef position at $74k salary**. The benefits are basically the same as what I already have—health insurance, 401(k), etc.—so financially, I’d actually be taking about a **$10k pay cut**.
The main benefit I see is getting Sous Chef experience, developing my leadership/management skills, and having the title on my résumé for future opportunities.
For chefs who have made a similar move: **Would you take the pay cut for the title and experience? Did becoming a Sous Chef help your career enough to make it worth it?**
I’m trying to think long-term, but I also don’t want to take on more responsibility, potentially work even more hours, and make less money without a meaningful payoff later.
Would appreciate advice from anyone who’s been in this position.

I'm curious because do I or do we need to study the theories, principles, and laws to that profession? Like is it REALLY NECESSARY and are we going to use it after graduation? or even in the job? Because I'm thinking about it that I just want to take TESDA but I still going to take college.

I'm m in a overthinking moment that being a chef or good at cooking can do it even you take other courses/programs, because it is a SKILL that everyone will going to learn, but I really doubting my self because what if there's a small detail that I don't know but I'm really supposed to know?

Plus is it really about the TITLE for a person to BECOME a PROFESSION or to be CALLED a PROFESSIONAL just because of the title? Or it is okay that even there is no TITLE of being a CHEF but you're really good at cooking, is it consider and normalize?

We are gearing up for our upcoming Pop-Up in the Phoenix/Scottsdale area, and I’m looking for a skilled, passionate Pitmaster or Lead Cook who wants a creative canvas and a ground-floor entry into a growing brand.

What I’m Looking For:

Fire-Management Experience: Real skill with offset wood and commercial pellet smoker setups.

Flawless Execution: Ability to bring locked-in recipes, craft rubs, and botanical sauce profiles to high culinary standards.

Collaborative Mindset: You manage the pit and kitchen execution—I handle Front of House, guest experience, and the brand vision.

What’s In It For You:

Guaranteed Day-Rate Pay: Paid compensation for prep and event execution (funded via ticket sales for tastings/pop-ups; initial R&D covered out-of-pocket).

Creative Input: Collaboration during menu scaling and execution testing.

Future Leadership: Priority position / first right of refusal for the Lead Pitmaster/Executive role as we move toward our brick-and-mortar launch.

If you’re hungry to build something fresh in the Valley and want to showcase your skill behind the smoke, DM me —let’s talk! 🤝

📌 Help us find the right fit: Please Like, Share, and Tag anyone in your network who would be a great asset to the team! 👇🔥