How To Become A Pastry Cook: What It Is and Career Path

What is a pastry cook and how to become one

Updated January 8, 2025

4 min read

Quoted expert

Tonya Whitfield

If you've always been passionate about pastries, it may be high time to pursue a career as a pastry chef. As a pastry chef, you will prepare quality bread, desserts, sweets in a restaurant, cafe, or pastry shop. Depending on your employer, you may be required to follow certain recipes, but some jobs may also give you the freedom to create your recipes.

Aside from creating pastries, the job of a pastry chef involves preparing ingredients, monitoring inventory, managing disposal of unused ingredients, creating recipes (if needed), ordering supplies, and training other staff members on pastry creation.

Many pastry chefs have formal culinary education, but it is possible to attain this role without culinary school. Experience and proven skill in pastry creation are often more important for employers. As such, they often require a cooking demonstration before hiring people for this role.

Pastry chefs work in the cold parts of the kitchen and stay on their feet most of the time. In terms of salary, they make an average of $19 per hour or about $38,000 a year.

What general advice would you give to a pastry cook?

Tonya Whitfield

Professor Culinary Arts/ Culinary Management San Diego Mesa College, San Diego Mesa College

The more skills you can obtain while in college and/or training the higher the wage. For example, I trained in classical culinary techniques. My college offers certificates that specialize in Meat & Seafood fabrication and Baking & Pastry. Why not take that extra class or two to gain more technical training to make me more of a value higher. My pay is higher due to my skill being more. Plus, I am saving the employer training hours which will benefit for higher pay.

ScorePastry CookUS Average

Salary

2.7

Avg. Salary $34,858

Avg. Salary $59,228

Stability level

6.2

Growth rate 16%

Growth rate 0.3%

Diversity

8.5

Race

American Indian and Alaska Native 1.37%

Asian 9.55%

Black or African American 10.44%

Hispanic or Latino 22.47%

Unknown 5.14%

White 51.03%

Gender

female 70.24%

male 29.76%

Age - 37

Race

American Indian and Alaska Native 3.00%

Asian 7.00%

Black or African American 14.00%

Hispanic or Latino 19.00%

White 57.00%

Gender

female 47.00%

male 53.00%

Age - 37

Stress level

6.2

Stress level is manageable

7.1 - high

Complexity level

4.3

Complexity level is basic

7 - challenging

Work life balance

7.4

Work life balance is good

6.4 - fair

Key steps to become a pastry cook

Explore pastry cook education requirements

Most common pastry cook degrees

Associate

50.6 %

Bachelor's

24.6 %

Diploma

10.2 %

Start to develop specific pastry cook skills

Skills	Percentages
Culinary	17.21%
Cleanliness	9.96%
Food Handling	9.83%
Quality Standards	7.46%
Fine Dining	6.29%

Complete relevant pastry cook training and internships

Accountants spend an average of Less than 1 month on post-employment, on-the-job training. New pastry cooks learn the skills and techniques required for their job and employer during this time. The chart below shows how long it takes to gain competency as a pastry cook based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics data and data from real pastry cook resumes.

Gain additional pastry cook certifications

Pastry cook certifications can show employers you have a baseline of knowledge expected for the position. Certifications can also make you a more competitive candidate. Even if employers don't require a specific pastry cook certification, having one may help you stand out relative to other applicants.

The most common certifications for pastry cooks include Certified Master Pastry Chef (CMPC) and Food Safety Manager Certification.

More About Certifications

Research pastry cook duties and responsibilities

Manage cold kitchen production for a luxury hotel with a Michelin star restaurant
Clean steamers, hot @ cold line.
Serve customers ordering at the bistro.
Work in dining room during Sunday brunch and buffets serving desserts.

Prepare your pastry cook resume

When your background is strong enough, you can start writing your pastry cook resume.

You can use Zippia's AI resume builder to make the resume writing process easier while also making sure that you include key information that hiring managers expect to see on a pastry cook resume. You'll find resume tips and examples of skills, responsibilities, and summaries, all provided by Zippi, your career sidekick.

Choose from 10+ customizable pastry cook resume templates

Build a professional pastry cook resume in minutes. Browse through our resume examples to identify the best way to word your resume. Then choose from 10+ resume templates to create your pastry cook resume.