COOKING PROFESSION IS A LIFETIME CAREER

Cooking is an art form, and like other forms of art, proper tutelage is invaluable to success. The great painters in history studied under great painters before them. Becoming a chef is no different. A cook is like someone who paints a house, while a chef is someone who paints masterpiece painting.
Kitchen profession is challenging; for those who have been in the business a while, the challenge is how to continuously expand their culinary repertoire; for the hopefuls, the challenge is how to start right in the culinary arts world.

 Culinary art was once seen either as a hobby or as a chore or as a fashion in general. Now it is rightly regarded as a highly skilled – highly paid professional within a multi billion dollars industry. The food industry is a leader in generating employment worldwide. From Executive Chefs, Restaurant Manager, Business Owner, Food Stylist, Kitchen Researcher…. The opportunities are endless.
A culinary arts profession is a fulfilling and a financially rewarding career, chef profession offers unlimited – endless opportunities; travel, career growth, financial stability and most importantly is the unmatched feeling of joy and triumph whenever the food you cook is appreciated.

Working as a chef is very demanding, with a lot of pressure at service time. Kitchens get very hectic especially when many dishes must be produced at the same time. Chefs must be able to deal with pressure. The challenge for every chef is to simultaneously perform tasks, put the right ingredients and flavors and to keep the kitchen team working in synchrony.

Chefs need good communication, management and leadership skills to manage and train kitchen staff. They are responsible for budgets and negotiating with suppliers. Kitchen discipline is not different from military discipline; some even believe that discipline in kitchen is twice demanding as those in military.

What makes a chef?

The finest restaurants in the world hire only those who have solid kitchen experiences, positive personal values and professional work ethics. Those who have completed certification from credible culinary arts schools enjoy higher employment and career advancement opportunities.

Becoming a chef is not as easy as heating a pan, working in a kitchen involves a great deal of on-the-job-training and off-the-job college study as well. To become a chef, it is necessary to learn different methods of food preparation and cooking. Training usually begins with simpler (but repetitive) preparation and cooking tasks. Hygiene and safety including the safe handling of knives is very important. Different cooking skills, such as carving or cake decorating can be learned on the job.

Career options


Kitchen professionals have unlimited choices to pursue their careers. The first best choice to start a kitchen career is the restaurant.

There are small, individually run restaurants, chef-owned fine dining establishment, larger operations that have multiple outlets or high seating capacity and there are corporate restaurants.


The next obvious choice is the hotels or resorts. Other foodservice operations, such as catering, institutional food services, corporate food services, are not always on the cutting edge of culinary arts but is equally challenging.


The personal chef is becoming a larger component of the foodservice industry. In the past, this job was mainly concerned with being the chef for a person or family. It involved everything from shopping to preparing the meals, and perks often included traveling with the client, or extended periods of downtime when the client was away.

Today, the personal chef industry has developed into a kind of specialized catering company. Chefs often have several clients, and, rather than cook on a daily basis, they prepare a series of meals to last the week. This can be done in client’s home, or at a centralized kitchen where meals are then packaged for delivery. This style of personal service allows the chef to schedule their own time and amount of work – a benefit that is reflected in increasing number of chefs in this category.

There are many other areas that chefs could pursue with a culinary degree. Chefs can be found working for major food companies in research and development, in research for large restaurant chains, or as production chefs for specialty food producers. Chefs are also in demand in hospitals, schools and corporate facilities.

Of course, culinary does not have to mean cooking either. Some chefs take their knowledge of food and become restaurant managers, food and beverage directors of hotels and resorts. Some chef who tire of working in the kitchen, but want to stay connected become food sales representatives. They may represent a specialty grower, or producer, or they may be a rep for a large foodservice company.

Still others combine their culinary education with their personal and professional interests, such as writing or photography, which can lead to careers in food writing for newspapers, magazines or cookbooks.

And, of course, there is also food styling, the profession that makes food look its best and/or authentic in front of a camera to produce both still-pictures and video productions that we see of food.

with Chef Boy Logro and Chef Nobu

Not all chefs are equal
There are a number of different types of chef. Large kitchens in restaurants and hotels are divided into departments, each responsible for specific preparation and cooking activities such as the Entremetier who is responsible for preparing vegetable items, Garde Manger responsible in the operation of cold kitchen, Saucier who prepares all hot sauces.
Trainee chefs or commis, work three to six months in each section to gain experience in every area of the kitchen. They learn for instance how to prepare and cook vegetables or make sauces, as well as doing general cleaning.


Each different section of the kitchen is run by a Chef de Partie, the next step is Sous Chef or second chef, who is skilled enough to run any section, and to take charge of whole kitchen in the absence of the Executive Chef. The Executive Chef runs the whole kitchen, including planning menus, ordering supplies, managing staff and budgets, and ensuring food of a consistently high standard is produced.


Skills and Talents to becoming a Chef


The most basic skill, the one that schools are designed to teach, is the technical. These skills are the basis of every chef’s talent – knife skills, cooking methods, timing, mise en place, and (the ultimate technical skill) making cooking on the line graceful, even during the rush.
There are four basic categories of skills that every chef uses during his or her career: technical, culinary, organizational, and managerial. Each builds upon the other. These skills are the basics of becoming a good chef.

The other skill taught in school is culinary. Most chefs have a good palate to begin, but training for flavor and seasoning, new flavor combinations, creative plates and presentations, diving deep into a cultures cuisine; all take training and practice.

The other two skill sets are what distinguish a cook from a Chef. A Chef is concerned with more than his/her own piece of the kitchen – they have the whole kitchen as a responsibility. With this in mind, organization skill is essential. How to stay organized and have the kitchen run smoothly and efficiently, and how to conduct business (ordering, scheduling, and food costing); are all part of the chef’s duties and responsibilities.


Hand in hand with organizational skills are managerial skills. A chef understands how to work with people and get them to work for him/her. These skills are the highest level because they involve sharing knowledge and skill with new breed of kitchen professional hopefuls. The most often-seen method is training, but ultimately being a mentor to a cook and to develop their career is the highest skill a chef can attain.


Even a chef who is doing 95 percent managerial work needs to keep the knife skills toned and ready for use. A finely-honed palate needs adjusting and testing to stay tuned.

Culinary Arts

Cooking school has taught the basic skills, and the first few jobs allow for the development of those skills.
It is best for all hopefuls to start their careers from the ranks; start as “commis 3”, the entry level in the kitchen brigade. This way you get to practice and perfect as many basic skills as possible needed and from there, progress into more difficult tasks in the kitchen.

The first few years of a culinary career are an exploratory period. You get paid to keep practicing your skills and to explore your new vocation for what really excites you.

Graduation from a professional culinary arts school is the best opportunity to assess the skills you have and determine what you want or need to improve. Then, the choice of what foodservice venue in which to concentrate your career will be easier: The beginning of a career path should be based on the skills needed be practiced.


Eventually, there will come a time when you choose one path. It may be in the hotel environment, cruise ships, a or independent restaurants, or inflight catering. Whatever you choose, the best way to start a culinary arts career is to study in Culinary Arts and is associated with Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (TESDA)





Tired of your Career?
SWITCH NOW!
ENROLL NOW!
And enjoy T R I P  to Europe and AROUND THE WORLD
visit our website:  HALAL CULINARY ARTS

Chef Tato with the former Prime Minister of Malaysia- His Excellency Ahmad Bin Badawi