Cooks, Restaurant

Career Overview

Prepare, season, and cook dishes such as soups, meats, vegetables, or desserts in restaurants. May order supplies, keep records and accounts, price items on menu, or plan menu.

Also Known As

  • Cook
  • Grill Cook
  • Line Cook
  • Prep Cook (Preparation Cook)

Alternate Job Titles

  • Back Line Cook
  • Back of House Team Member (BOH Team Member)
  • Banquet Cook
  • Breakfast Cook
  • Broiler Cook
  • Chef De Partie
  • Cook
  • Foreign Food Specialty Cook
  • Fry Cook
  • Grill Cook
  • Hotel and Restaurant Cook
  • Larder Cook
  • Line Cook
  • Pizza Maker
  • Prep Cook (Preparation Cook)

What You'll Do

In this role, your typical responsibilities include:

  • Ensure food is stored and cooked at correct temperature by regulating temperature of ovens, broilers, grills, and roasters.
  • Inspect and clean food preparation areas, such as equipment, work surfaces, and serving areas, to ensure safe and sanitary food-handling practices.
  • Portion, arrange, and garnish food, and serve food to waiters or patrons.
  • Ensure freshness of food and ingredients by checking for quality, keeping track of old and new items, and rotating stock.
  • Season and cook food according to recipes or personal judgment and experience.
  • Coordinate and supervise work of kitchen staff.
  • Bake, roast, broil, and steam meats, fish, vegetables, and other foods.

Key Abilities

This career requires key abilities in:

  • Near Vision
  • Manual Dexterity
  • Problem Sensitivity
  • Oral Comprehension
  • Perceptual Speed
  • Speech Recognition
  • Visual Color Discrimination
  • Trunk Strength
  • Control Precision
  • Finger Dexterity

Work Style

People who excel in this career typically demonstrate:

  • Dependability
  • Attention to Detail
  • Cooperation
  • Stress Tolerance
  • Perseverance

What Matters in This Career

This career tends to satisfy these work values:

  • Support
  • Relationships
  • Independence
  • Achievement
  • Working Conditions

Education & Preparation

Typical Education: High School Diploma - or the equivalent (for example, GED)

On-the-Job Training: Anything beyond short demonstration, up to and including 1 month

Education Details: Usually requires a high school diploma or GED, though some occupations may not.

Experience Required: Some occupations may need little or no previous experience; others require several months to a year of experience. For example, landscaping and groundskeeping workers might require very little training or previous experience, while agricultural equipment operators can benefit from on-the job training.

Technology You'll Use

Popular Technologies & Software

  • Facebook
  • Microsoft Excel
  • Microsoft Office software
  • Microsoft Outlook
  • Microsoft Word

Tools & Equipment

  • Blenders
  • Boning knives
  • Charbroilers
  • Chefs' knives
  • Cimeter knives
  • Commercial microwave ovens
  • Convection ovens
  • Conveyor ovens
  • Filet knives
  • Food slicing machines
  • Food steamers
  • Fryers
  • Gas grills
  • Griddles
  • Grinders

Work Environment

  • Wear Common Protective or Safety Equipment such as Safety Shoes, Glasses, Gloves, Hearing Protection, Hard Hats, or Life Jackets
  • Spend Time Standing
  • Indoors, Environmentally Controlled
  • Spend Time Using Your Hands to Handle, Control, or Feel Objects, Tools, or Controls
  • Contact With Others

Salary & Job Market

Salary PercentileAnnual Wage
Entry-Level (10th percentile)$28,010
Median$36,830
Top Earners (90th percentile)$47,340

Workers Employed Nationally: 1,452,130

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If you're interested in this career, you might also consider:


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Occupational data sourced from the O*NET OnLine database, developed by the U.S. Department of Labor, Employment and Training Administration. Wage data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics (OEWS), 2024.

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