Foodservice assistants work in various settings, usually in large facilities where food is served to a high number of people, such as schools, hospitals, or nursing homes. Their job is to help with preparing and serving meals.

They work in the kitchen preparing ingredients, make sure working and serving areas are clean, serve food and beverages, and collect payment at the end of the service. They take on customer complaints and forward them to the manager if there is no immediate solution to the problem.

Having good customer service skills is a must here, as well as the ability to work as part of a team. If you have experience working in a food service environment, your chances might be higher for landing a job. But this is an entry-level position, so you should not worry too much about previous placements.

What Does a Food Service Assistant Do

There are certain skills that many food service assistants have in order to accomplish their responsibilities. By taking a look through resumes, we were able to narrow down the most common skills for a person in this position. We discovered that a lot of resumes listed dexterity, listening skills and physical strength.

Learn more about what a Food Service Assistant does

How To Become a Food Service Assistant

If you're interested in becoming a food service assistant, one of the first things to consider is how much education you need. We've determined that 32.8% of food service assistants have a bachelor's degree. In terms of higher education levels, we found that 2.2% of food service assistants have master's degrees. Even though some food service assistants have a college degree, it's possible to become one with only a high school degree or GED.

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Food Service Assistant Job Description

A food service assistant is responsible for helping senior members of staff with food preparation and preservation in restaurants, hotels, schools, and other food-providing establishments. Their duties include preparing ingredients and food according to approved recipes, helping customers with payments, and ensuring that food is well-preserved or fresh.

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Food Service Assistant Career Paths

Average Salary for a Food Service Assistant

Food Service Assistants in America make an average salary of $29,354 per year or $14 per hour. The top 10 percent makes over $36,000 per year, while the bottom 10 percent under $23,000 per year.
Average Food Service Assistant Salary
$29,354 Yearly
$14.11 hourly

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Roles and Types of Food Service Assistant

The role of a food service assistant includes a wide range of responsibilities. These responsibilities can vary based on an individual's specific job, company, or industry.Here are some general food service assistant responsibilities:

  • Assists in the preparation of food on a daily basis adheres to proper food handling procedures prep work may include but not limited to: chopping vegetables, boiling pastas, carving
  • Assist in inventory control by maintaining organization of coolers, freezers,
  • Requests (and conserves) food and supplies necessary to perform assigned duties. Assists in the preparation of a variety of simple food products in accordance with standardized recipes, policies,

There are several types of food service assistant, including:

Line Cook

Role:

As a sort of in-charge person, line cooks definitely have a lot of responsibility on their shoulders. While you might think the head chef does most of the heavy lifting, think again. The majority of the food is prepared by the line cook.

Now, the head chef, or even the sous chef, give line cooks the direction they need to make the food. Typically, as a line cook, you'll have a particular place in the kitchen that you'll look after. Like, maybe you'll get assigned to the grill, and then you'll be in charge of everything at the grill. Or you might be assigned to the veggie prep area.

Wherever you are assigned, you should be prepared to work some crazy hours. Since you're preparing the food, you'll need at least an hour, if not two, to get everything ready. Once your line is prepped, then you're ready to take on your shift. With that extra 1-2 hours, you'll probably be working around 8-10 hours a shift.

  • Average Salary: $32,894
  • Degree: High School Diploma

Food Service Worker

Role:

Food service workers are employed in restaurants, cafeterias, grocery stores, and any other institution that offers dining services, such as schools, hospitals, or prisons. If you want to learn everything about food preparation and what it takes to be a restaurant manager or a top-notch chef, taking on a job as a food service worker is a great place to start.

Your job will be to assist kitchen staff in preparing meals. Your responsibilities include helping to keep the kitchen spotless, prepping ingredients, slicing, dicing, rinsing, and peeling while making sure all safety regulations are respected.

No experience is needed to be hired as a food service worker; you just have to be attentive and organized and respect the authority of your superiors, which in this case is basically everyone in the kitchen.

  • Average Salary: $28,753
  • Degree: High School Diploma

Food Server

Role:

The sky is the limit for food servers. In this career, there are so many opportunities that your head will be spinning from which job you decide to take. Maybe you're a high-school student looking for a reliable paycheck. You might decide to go work for a fast-food restaurant.

Or maybe you're a professional in the food industry. In this case, you might become a food server for a high-end sit-down restaurant. Whichever direction you choose to take, the tips you'll earn will be more than enough to pay the bills.

Food servers can even find work at sports arenas or through catering services. There's always a spot for a food server wherever food can be served. The best part of this job is that you'll be able to choose your hours. Whenever you want to work, you'll be able to.

  • Average Salary: $25,209
  • Degree: High School Diploma

States With The Most Food Service Assistant Jobs

Mouse over a state to see the number of active food service assistant jobs in each state. The darker areas on the map show where food service assistants earn the highest salaries across all 50 states.

Average Salary: Job Openings:

Number Of Food Service Assistant Jobs By State

RankStateNumber of JobsAverage Salary
1California2,743$31,798
2Texas2,579$22,963
3Florida2,204$23,495
4New York1,700$33,145
5Pennsylvania1,527$23,868
6North Carolina1,485$26,534
7Ohio1,394$26,334
8Wisconsin1,385$27,297
9Minnesota1,339$31,247
10Georgia1,280$20,580
11Illinois1,261$25,826
12New Jersey1,184$27,111
13Virginia1,174$24,503
14Michigan1,159$29,187
15Massachusetts1,108$33,216
16South Carolina847$24,910
17Indiana827$23,237
18Tennessee794$20,252
19Iowa760$23,881
20Washington747$31,428
21Colorado728$29,728
22Arizona708$26,390
23Maryland623$26,861
24Missouri563$23,045
25Kentucky493$24,370
26Alabama467$18,954
27Connecticut450$30,438
28Oregon393$29,923
29Utah391$28,721
30Louisiana380$19,138
31Kansas344$25,405
32Oklahoma330$21,981
33Mississippi326$21,385
34Nevada299$25,784
35Arkansas257$22,442
36New Hampshire252$27,657
37New Mexico247$22,712
38Nebraska237$25,454
39West Virginia235$24,273
40Idaho193$25,083
41Maine174$29,375
42South Dakota161$27,701
43Alaska153$27,545
44Montana150$26,931
45Delaware134$29,267
46Rhode Island119$33,106
47Hawaii103$29,291
48North Dakota96$28,688
49Wyoming78$24,669
50Vermont75$30,469

Food Service Assistant Education

Food Service Assistant Majors

19.4 %

Food Service Assistant Degrees

Bachelors

32.8 %

High School Diploma

31.7 %

Associate

19.8 %

Top Skills For a Food Service Assistant

The skills section on your resume can be almost as important as the experience section, so you want it to be an accurate portrayal of what you can do. Luckily, we've found all of the skills you'll need so even if you don't have these skills yet, you know what you need to work on. Out of all the resumes we looked through, 12.5% of food service assistants listed patients on their resume, but soft skills such as dexterity and listening skills are important as well.

Choose From 10+ Customizable Food Service Assistant Resume templates

Zippia allows you to choose from different easy-to-use Food Service Assistant templates, and provides you with expert advice. Using the templates, you can rest assured that the structure and format of your Food Service Assistant resume is top notch. Choose a template with the colors, fonts & text sizes that are appropriate for your industry.

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Food Service Assistant diversity

Food Service Assistant Gender Distribution

Female
Female
64%
Male
Male
36%

After extensive research and analysis, Zippia's data science team found that:

  • Among food service assistants, 64.1% of them are women, while 35.9% are men.

  • The most common race/ethnicity among food service assistants is White, which makes up 55.4% of all food service assistants.

  • The most common foreign language among food service assistants is Spanish at 59.7%.

Online Courses For Food Service Assistant That You May Like

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1. Rebuilding Our Relationship with Food

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Have you ever made a conscious effort to change the way you eat (for health or other reasons) and then felt frustrated when your plans were derailed? You’re not alone. The best laid plans are often sabotaged by a food environment that makes it increasingly hard to make healthier food choices. This can leave many people feeling mistrustful of food or feeling that our relationship with food is somehow broken. In this course, we’ll explore the history of our changing food environment, the science...

2. Introduction to Food and Our Environment

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This course is designed to help learners around the world become more sustainable eaters. Course videos can be watched in any order. Feel free to explore special areas of interest by skipping ahead and coming back to less familiar topics at a later stage. Together, we’ll explore key topics, like how food production impacts the environment and why meat production and protein consumption are often at the center of the debate around sustainability. We’ll introduce the pros and cons of different...

3. Fun food safety and sanitation course

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4.5
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The food safety course will help prepare you for safely working in a kitchen and food handler tests like Servesafe...

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Best States For a Food Service Assistant

Some places are better than others when it comes to starting a career as a food service assistant. The best states for people in this position are Massachusetts, New York, Rhode Island, and California. Food service assistants make the most in Massachusetts with an average salary of $33,216. Whereas in New York and Rhode Island, they would average $33,145 and $33,106, respectively. While food service assistants would only make an average of $31,798 in California, you would still make more there than in the rest of the country. We determined these as the best states based on job availability and pay. By finding the median salary, cost of living, and using the Bureau of Labor Statistics' Location Quotient, we narrowed down our list of states to these four.

1. Minnesota

Total Food Service Assistant Jobs: 1,339
Highest 10% Earn:
$37,000
Location Quotient:
1.57

2. New York

Total Food Service Assistant Jobs: 1,700
Highest 10% Earn:
$40,000
Location Quotient:
1.03

3. Michigan

Total Food Service Assistant Jobs: 1,159
Highest 10% Earn:
$35,000
Location Quotient:
1.16
Full List Of Best States For Food Service Assistants

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Top Food Service Assistant Employers

Most Common Employers For Food Service Assistant

RankCompanyAverage SalaryHourly RateJob Openings
1Costco Wholesale$37,061$17.82195
2Target$36,788$17.6983
3University of Wisconsin System$32,390$15.5723
4Houston Methodist$31,332$15.0627
5Aurora Health Care$31,244$15.0239
6The School District of Philadelphia$31,072$14.9433
7WUSD$30,899$14.8622
8Methodist Hospital Of Henderson, Kentucky$30,710$14.7625
9PeaceHealth$30,616$14.7270
10Cobb County School District$29,844$14.3553