What is a Line Chef?

A line chef, also known as a line cook or prep cook, is responsible for preparing and plating dishes according to the restaurant menu and the chef's specifications. As a line chef, you are also responsible for assisting the chef on stocking, inventory, and setting up the kitchen, ensuring cleanliness and safety alongside dish preparation, and adhering to hygiene and safety standards. You are also expected to work with other kitchen employees towards customer satisfaction, wash and clean the cooking utensils used after your shift.

As a line chef, you should be a team player, know how to manage time, have great organizational, listening, and communication skills. Formal education is not compulsory to be a line chef, but a degree from a culinary school, vocational school, or related courses would be preferred. Experience in the field is also required as well as how to safely use kitchen utensils. Your average salary as a line chef is $26,203 per year.

What Does a Line Chef Do

There are certain skills that many line chefs 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 business skills, communication skills and creativity.

Learn more about what a Line Chef does

How To Become a Line Chef

If you're interested in becoming a line chef, one of the first things to consider is how much education you need. We've determined that 23.3% of line chefs have a bachelor's degree. In terms of higher education levels, we found that 0.9% of line chefs have master's degrees. Even though some line chefs have a college degree, it's possible to become one with only a high school degree or GED.

Learn More About How To Become a Line Chef
Top Line Chef Jobs Near You

Line Chef Career Paths

As you move along in your career, you may start taking on more responsibilities or notice that you've taken on a leadership role. Using our career map, a line chef can determine their career goals through the career progression. For example, they could start out with a role such as sous chef, progress to a title such as executive chef and then eventually end up with the title director of food and beverage.

Line Chef

Average Salary for a Line Chef

Line Chefs in America make an average salary of $26,651 per year or $13 per hour. The top 10 percent makes over $37,000 per year, while the bottom 10 percent under $18,000 per year.
Average Line Chef Salary
$26,651 Yearly
$12.81 hourly
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Roles and Types of Line Chef

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

  • Performs prep work such as washing, peeling, cutting
  • Assist kitchen staff with various tasks as needed,
  • Delight our guests by providing quality

There are several types of line chef, 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

Chef

Role:

MMM, do you smell that? Working as a chef comes with some good-smelling perks, especially if you're good at what you do. Chefs are in charge of preparing food for establishments where food is served, typically restaurants.

The schedule of a chef varies widely depending on where you're cooking. Sometimes they work early mornings, late evenings, weekends and even holidays. Yes, people still want to eat your delicious food on Christmas

  • Average Salary: $46,824
  • Degree: Associate Degree

Sous Chef

Role:

Chefs are often considered artists, who create culinary masterpieces pleasing to vision and palate alike. Sous chefs are there at every step of the process, assisting the head chef, in a professionally run kitchen, in making the magic happen.

They contribute to creating the menu, making sure every necessary ingredient is in stock and fresh, supervise sanitation, and do everything in their power to reach the expected quality standard of the meals.

Defying stereotypical gender roles, or perhaps adhering to less obvious ones, the sous chef position is primarily filled by men, especially in high-end kitchens. With all the long hours, heat, and a high-pressure working environment, prejudice against women has them framed as not being physically and emotionally strong enough to work in kitchens, and receive fewer opportunities to hold high-status jobs as cooks.

Restaurants behind the scenes are apparently not just the site for exquisite food preparation but prove to be an excellent field for institutionalized sexism as well. Go sous chefettes, it is high time to change this demographic!

  • Average Salary: $48,716
  • Degree: Associate Degree
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States With The Most Line Chef Jobs

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

Average Salary: Job Openings:

Number Of Line Chef Jobs By State

RankStateNumber of JobsAverage Salary
1Texas3,245$23,923
2Florida3,044$22,164
3California2,821$31,289
4Illinois1,314$35,978
5Ohio1,307$31,179
6New York1,245$35,842
7Georgia1,216$23,647
8Pennsylvania1,204$36,638
9North Carolina1,201$25,731
10Tennessee1,022$19,787
11Virginia913$25,450
12Indiana906$29,640
13Arizona884$25,565
14Michigan832$37,968
15Colorado787$28,208
16Massachusetts735$40,255
17New Jersey719$37,534
18Minnesota680$34,106
19South Carolina635$19,410
20Missouri627$25,279
21Washington591$37,515
22Maryland554$28,028
23Kentucky513$24,556
24Oklahoma487$23,201
25Wisconsin480$29,600
26Utah457$21,707
27Louisiana451$18,248
28Alabama429$24,379
29Iowa376$25,297
30Oregon349$29,185
31Connecticut315$28,424
32Nevada307$29,397
33Arkansas300$20,986
34Mississippi290$22,435
35Kansas241$20,666
36New Mexico202$22,378
37Nebraska190$24,807
38Idaho182$18,215
39New Hampshire160$41,787
40Maine153$35,072
41West Virginia151$24,373
42Montana142$28,295
43Alaska96$40,803
44North Dakota96$32,667
45Rhode Island89$37,498
46Delaware89$27,579
47South Dakota77$27,923
48Hawaii75$30,080
49Wyoming52$28,946
50Vermont49$28,362

Line Chef Education

Line Chef Majors

Culinary Arts
44.5 %
Business
12.5 %
Hospitality Management
5.4 %

Line Chef Degrees

Associate

33.6 %

High School Diploma

28.6 %

Bachelors

23.3 %

Top Colleges for Line Chefs

1. Stanford University

Stanford, CA • Private

In-State Tuition

$51,354

Enrollment

7,083

2. Boston University

Boston, MA • Private

In-State Tuition

$53,948

Enrollment

17,238

3. Drexel University

Philadelphia, PA • Private

In-State Tuition

$53,244

Enrollment

15,557

4. University of Pennsylvania

Philadelphia, PA • Private

In-State Tuition

$55,584

Enrollment

10,764

5. Cornell University

Ithaca, NY • Private

In-State Tuition

$55,188

Enrollment

15,105

6. Northwestern University

Evanston, IL • Private

In-State Tuition

$54,568

Enrollment

8,451

7. SUNY College of Technology at Alfred

Alfred, NY • Private

In-State Tuition

$8,570

Enrollment

3,721

8. SUNY College of Technology at Delhi

Delhi, NY • Private

In-State Tuition

$8,360

Enrollment

3,142

9. University of Charleston

Charleston, WV • Private

In-State Tuition

$30,900

Enrollment

1,910

10. University of Texas at Austin

Austin, TX • Private

In-State Tuition

$10,610

Enrollment

40,329

Top Skills For a Line Chef

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, 16.1% of line chefs listed kitchen equipment on their resume, but soft skills such as business skills and communication skills are important as well.

  • Kitchen Equipment, 16.1%
  • Sanitation Standards, 11.3%
  • Food Handling, 7.8%
  • Customer Service, 7.8%
  • Cleanliness, 7.7%
  • Other Skills, 49.3%

Choose From 10+ Customizable Line Chef Resume templates

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

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Line Chef diversity

Line Chef Gender Distribution

Male
Male
69%
Female
Female
31%

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

  • Among line chefs, 30.6% of them are women, while 69.4% are men.

  • The most common race/ethnicity among line chefs is White, which makes up 55.5% of all line chefs.

  • The most common foreign language among line chefs is Spanish at 59.9%.

Online Courses For Line Chef That You May Like

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1. Patient Safety and Quality Improvement: Developing a Systems View (Patient Safety I)

coursera

In this course, you will be able develop a systems view for patient safety and quality improvement in healthcare. By then end of this course, you will be able to: 1) Describe a minimum of four key events in the history of patient safety and quality improvement, 2) define the key characteristics of high reliability organizations, and 3) explain the benefits of having strategies for both proactive and reactive systems thinking...

2. Leading Healthcare Quality and Safety

coursera

Ensuring patient safety and healthcare quality is critical and should be a key focus of everyone in healthcare practice. This course provides healthcare practitioners and others with an introduction to the knowledge and skills needed to lead patient safety and quality improvement initiatives at the micro and macro levels. Participants will explore the foundations of health care quality and the science underlying patient safety and quality improvement, design and select effective health care...

3. Fun food safety and sanitation course

udemy
4.5
(411)

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 Line Chef

Some places are better than others when it comes to starting a career as a line chef. The best states for people in this position are New Hampshire, Alaska, Massachusetts, and Michigan. Line chefs make the most in New Hampshire with an average salary of $41,787. Whereas in Alaska and Massachusetts, they would average $40,803 and $40,255, respectively. While line chefs would only make an average of $37,968 in Michigan, 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. Michigan

Total Line Chef Jobs: 832
Highest 10% Earn:
$54,000
Location Quotient:
0.92

$37,968

Avg. Salary

View 832 Line Chef Jobs In MI

2. Alaska

Total Line Chef Jobs: 96
Highest 10% Earn:
$49,000
Location Quotient:
0.98

$40,803

Avg. Salary

View 96 Line Chef Jobs In AK

3. New Hampshire

Total Line Chef Jobs: 160
Highest 10% Earn:
$61,000
Location Quotient:
0.78

$41,787

Avg. Salary

View 160 Line Chef Jobs In NH
Full List Of Best States For Line Chefs

How Do Line Chefs Rate Their Jobs?

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Top Line Chef Employers

Most Common Employers For Line Chef

RankCompanyAverage SalaryHourly RateJob Openings
1University of Rochester$30,041$14.4411
2Marriott International$29,568$14.2216
3Compass Group USA$29,360$14.1217
4Darden Restaurants$29,280$14.0827
5Aramark$28,814$13.8530
6Panera Bread$27,968$13.4527
7Management & Training$26,750$12.8657
8Buffalo Wild Wings$26,321$12.6516
9Panda Express$25,442$12.2322
10Hilton$25,257$12.1419
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Line Chef Videos

Paul Gerard's WORK THE LINE featuring Anthony Bourdain & Tom Colicchio
A Day in the Life of moto Chef Richard Farina

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Updated April 6, 2023