Fast food cook vs lead cook

The differences between fast food cooks and lead cooks can be seen in a few details. Each job has different responsibilities and duties. It typically takes 2-4 years to become both a fast food cook and a lead cook. Additionally, a lead cook has an average salary of $35,964, which is higher than the $26,093 average annual salary of a fast food cook.

The top three skills for a fast food cook include food handling, safety standards and customer service. The most important skills for a lead cook are customer service, food handling, and culinary.

Fast food cook vs lead cook overview

	Fast Food Cook	Lead Cook
Yearly salary	$26,093	$35,964
Hourly rate	$12.54	$17.29
Growth rate	16%	16%
Number of jobs	275,335	160,223
Job satisfaction	-	-
Most common degree	High School Diploma, 51%	Associate Degree, 35%
Average age	38	38
Years of experience	4	4

What does a fast food cook do?

Fast-food cooks maintain utensils, food preparation areas, and cooking surfaces. Besides cooking and serving beverages, fast food cooks also perform their daily duties as per the safety standards and health standards. Their other duties include ordering and taking supply deliveries, cleaning, preparing meals ingredients, and running cooking equipment such as griddles, deep fat fryers, or grills.

What does a lead cook do?

A lead cook, or lead line cook, is an individual restaurant employee who is in charge of supervising the chain of food preparation done by line cooks. Lead cooks work directly under head cooks or chefs who provide instructions in preparing meals. They are well-versed in the restaurant's food health and safety, such as regular hand washing, utensil sanitizing, and proper garbage disposal. To be a successful lead cook, they must obtain knowledge of various cooking techniques and be passionate about food.

Fast food cook vs lead cook salary

Fast food cooks and lead cooks have different pay scales, as shown below.

	Fast Food Cook	Lead Cook
Average salary	$26,093	$35,964
Salary range	Between $19,000 And $34,000	Between $27,000 And $46,000
Highest paying City	Boston, MA	Seattle, WA
Highest paying state	Massachusetts	Washington
Best paying company	Dell	Freeport-McMoRan
Best paying industry	Hospitality	Health Care

Differences between fast food cook and lead cook education

There are a few differences between a fast food cook and a lead cook in terms of educational background:

	Fast Food Cook	Lead Cook
Most common degree	High School Diploma, 51%	Associate Degree, 35%
Most common major	Business	Culinary Arts
Most common college	-	-

Fast food cook vs lead cook demographics

Here are the differences between fast food cooks' and lead cooks' demographics:

	Fast Food Cook	Lead Cook
Average age	38	38
Gender ratio	Male, 74.2% Female, 25.8%	Male, 72.6% Female, 27.4%
Race ratio	Black or African American, 10.4% Unknown, 4.7% Hispanic or Latino, 18.5% Asian, 8.6% White, 56.8% American Indian and Alaska Native, 1.1%	Black or African American, 9.3% Unknown, 4.7% Hispanic or Latino, 18.3% Asian, 9.4% White, 57.1% American Indian and Alaska Native, 1.1%
LGBT Percentage	6%	6%

Differences between fast food cook and lead cook duties and responsibilities

Fast food cook example responsibilities.

Operate mixers and manage ingredients to meet product quality and uniformity standards.
Execute daily operations of filtering of the fryers.
Leverage teamwork to fully utilize kitchen staff to generate remarkable food and service to ensure customer satisfaction.
Can make and food at mcdonalds.

Lead cook example responsibilities.

Manage food expo; facilitate food temp logs; creation of menu specials; management and supervision of production staff
Manage inventory and purchasing of groceries.
Operate standard cooking equipment including slicers, food choppers, fryers, refrigerators, ovens and stoves.
Operate ovens, stoves, grills, microwaves, turbo chefs, and fryers.
Use and clean commercial ovens, meat slicers, steamers, combination ovens and steam kettles.
Operate ovens, stoves, grills, microwaves, kettles, and tilt skillet.

Fast food cook vs lead cook skills

Common fast food cook skills

Food Handling, 18%
Safety Standards, 17%
Customer Service, 10%
Grills, 6%
Kitchen Equipment, 5%
Culinary, 4%

Common lead cook skills

Customer Service, 14%
Food Handling, 14%
Culinary, 11%
Food Service, 11%
Kitchen Equipment, 7%
Math, 5%

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Fast Food Cook vs Lead Cook

Updated January 8, 2025

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