All About Restaurant Cooks
Position Description Prepare, season, and cook dishes such as soups, meats, vegetables, or desserts in restaurants. May order supplies, keep records and accounts, price items on menu, or plan menu.
Life As a Restaurant Cook: What Do They Do?
- Carve and trim meats such as beef, veal, ham, pork, and lamb for hot or cold service, or for sandwiches.
- Prepare relishes and hors d’oeuvres.
- Portion, arrange, and garnish food, and serve food to waiters or patrons.
- Bake breads, rolls, cakes, and pastries.
- Ensure food is stored and cooked at correct temperature by regulating temperature of ovens, broilers, grills, and roasters.
- Butcher and dress animals, fowl, or shellfish, or cut and bone meat prior to cooking.
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Restaurant Cook Skills
Restaurant Cooks state the following job skills are important in their day-to-day work.
Monitoring: Monitoring/Assessing performance of yourself, other individuals, or organizations to make improvements or take corrective action.
Active Listening: Giving full attention to what other people are saying, taking time to understand the points being made, asking questions as appropriate, and not interrupting at inappropriate times.
Speaking: Talking to others to convey information effectively.
Time Management: Managing one’s own time and the time of others.
Critical Thinking: Using logic and reasoning to identify the strengths and weaknesses of alternative solutions, conclusions or approaches to problems.
Coordination: Adjusting actions in relation to others’ actions.
Related Job Titles
- Specialty Foods Cook
- Breakfast Cook
- Banquet Cook
- Foreign Food Specialty Cook
- Sandwich Artist
Is There Job Demand for Restaurant Cooks?
In 2016, there was an estimated number of 1,231,900 jobs in the United States for Restaurant Cook. New jobs are being produced at a rate of 11.8% which is above the national average. The Bureau of Labor Statistics predicts 145,300 new jobs for Restaurant Cook by 2026. Due to new job openings and attrition, there will be an average of 195,300 job openings in this field each year.
The states with the most job growth for Restaurant Cook are Colorado, Utah, and Texas. Watch out if you plan on working in Ohio, West Virginia, or Maine. These states have the worst job growth for this type of profession.
Restaurant Cook Salary
The salary for Restaurant Cooks ranges between about $19,420 and $37,630 a year.
Restaurant Cooks who work in District of Columbia, Washington, or New Jersey, make the highest salaries.
Below is a list of the median annual salaries for Restaurant Cooks in different U.S. states.
| State | Annual Mean Salary |
|---|---|
| Alabama | $24,080 |
| Alaska | $30,230 |
| Arizona | $28,330 |
| Arkansas | $22,980 |
| California | $30,620 |
| Colorado | $29,490 |
| Connecticut | $30,450 |
| Delaware | $27,430 |
| District of Columbia | $33,840 |
| Florida | $27,740 |
| Georgia | $24,280 |
| Hawaii | $34,330 |
| Idaho | $24,880 |
| Illinois | $27,720 |
| Indiana | $24,570 |
| Iowa | $24,700 |
| Kansas | $23,640 |
| Kentucky | $22,920 |
| Louisiana | $23,230 |
| Maine | $28,780 |
| Maryland | $28,220 |
| Massachusetts | $32,430 |
| Michigan | $25,550 |
| Minnesota | $29,120 |
| Mississippi | $22,340 |
| Missouri | $25,180 |
| Montana | $25,230 |
| Nebraska | $28,280 |
| Nevada | $31,960 |
| New Hampshire | $29,200 |
| New Jersey | $33,200 |
| New Mexico | $24,100 |
| New York | $30,440 |
| North Carolina | $24,950 |
| North Dakota | $28,130 |
| Ohio | $25,560 |
| Oklahoma | $24,000 |
| Oregon | $29,340 |
| Pennsylvania | $26,510 |
| Rhode Island | $30,890 |
| South Carolina | $23,680 |
| South Dakota | $26,630 |
| Tennessee | $24,370 |
| Texas | $25,400 |
| Utah | $27,350 |
| Vermont | $31,180 |
| Virginia | $26,590 |
| Washington | $32,370 |
| West Virginia | $23,520 |
| Wisconsin | $25,910 |
| Wyoming | $29,750 |
Tools & Technologies Used by Restaurant Cooks
Below is a list of the types of tools and technologies that Restaurant Cooks may use on a daily basis:
- Microsoft Excel
- Microsoft Word
- Microsoft Office
- Inventory management software
- Menu planning software
How to Become a Restaurant Cook
What kind of Restaurant Cook requirements are there?
What work experience do I need to become a Restaurant Cook?
Restaurant Cooks Sector
The table below shows the approximate number of Restaurant Cooks employed by various industries.
You May Also Be Interested In…
Career changers with experience as a Restaurant Cook sometimes find work in one of the following fields:
References:
Image Credit: U.S. Army Europe Images via Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic
More about our data sources and methodologies.
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