The Kitchen Hierarchy

by Chris Bruno
I have worked my entire career in the restaurant business, starting as a dishwasher and working my way up to Line Cook, Sous-Chef, and then Executive Chef before opening my own establishment, Fiddler’s Restaurant, in Brookfield, Connecticut, in 1990. After 13 years, we remodeled and renamed it Chris’s American Restaurant. Many people are unaware of the various types of kitchen staff required to make a restaurant run. In this article, I provide a brief description of the major positions in the kitchen hierarchy. The cold station chef or chef de garde mange ranks at the bottom of the kitchen hierarchy. Generally, this person assembles cold plates that do not need to be cooked, such as salads. Sometimes, he or she also assembles desserts if the restaurant lacks a pastry line. Line cooks, next up in the hierarchy, do most of the actual cooking in a given restaurant. Line cooks generally occupy a single station at once, and the staff at each station holds responsibility for a technique or a type of food. Thus, one line cook will work the grill while another prepares sauces, or the manager may assign a line cook to ready fish dishes, meat entrees, or vegetarian main plates. Eventually, most line cooks work every station before their bosses promote them to sous-chef positions. The pastry chef operates separately from the rest of the kitchen staff and does not move up in rank like the line cooks or others. This is because pastry-making is a separate skill set and requires different kinds of equipment. In addition, in the past, the rest of the kitchen crew may have felt biases against the pastry chef, as this used to be considered a female position. Although times have changed, the traditional rivalry between pastry and entrée chefs remains. In most restaurants, the sous-chef comes next in the hierarchy, although larger restaurants often employ an expediter. The expediter essentially acts as a coordinator: He or she ensures that all dishes are completed at the right time and arrive to the table together and at the proper temperature. In smaller restaurants, the sous-chef fulfills the duties of the expediter. In addition, the sous-chef prepares daily specials, ensures the restaurant contains proper provisions, oversees the staff, and performs other tasks as needed. In most restaurants, the chef de cuisine position becomes the next and final step of the hierarchy. This person develops the menu and represents the restaurant in the public arena. In larger establishments, the chef de cuisine will also employ an executive chef, whose duties include hiring and firing, taking care of administrative duties, interacting with guests, and ensuring that the menu meets the standards of the proprietors. In smaller restaurants, the chef de cuisine fulfills the duties of an executive chef.