Chef Manager

A2Dominion; England; On-site; GBP 11,000 - 12,000; Full time

Job summary

A UK housing association is seeking a Chef Manager for a permanent role in Reading, Berkshire, to lead a cooking team and ensure compliance with health standards while delivering high-quality catering services to residents. The ideal candidate will have strong leadership skills, a catering qualification, and experience in a care setting. This position offers a chance to positively impact the lives of residents aged 55+.

Qualifications

• Experience working in a care and support environment or catering for large volumes.
• Excellent organisational and time-management skills.
• Passion for leading a team and ownership of administrative tasks.

Responsibilities

• Lead and deliver catering services meeting health standards.
• Manage dietary needs and ensure meal prep aligns with resident preferences.
• Conduct health, safety, and food hygiene checks.
• Supervise a dedicated team and manage recruitment and development.

Skills

Catering/cooking qualification

Time-management skills

Organisational skills

Leadership

Basic Microsoft applications

English verbal and written communication

Job description

Job Details

Job title: Chef Manager
Contract: Permanent
Hours: 16.5 hours Friday, Saturday, Sunday
Salary: £11,145.42 - £11,617.32 per annum
Location: Onsite at Charles Clore Court, Reading, Berkshire

About A2Dominion

We are a UK housing association committed to a new vision – providing homes people love to live in. With over 38,000 homes in management across London and southern England, we provide a wide range of homes for social, affordable, and private rent, specialist services, as well as homes for sale and shared ownership. Our 70,000+ customers come from a diverse range of backgrounds with varying levels of income. We’re here to provide them all with homes that are safe, high quality and sustainable. And with social housing roots going back eight decades, we continue to ensure that every penny of profit is reinvested into our charitable social purpose – delivering more homes and better services for customers.

About the role

As the Chef Manager at Charles Clore Court, you will be responsible for leading and delivering a first‑class end‑to‑end catering service to the scheme, which accounts for 47 self‑contained apartments for residents aged 55+. Being both hands‑on with preparation and cooking and owning the ‘back office’ compliance, administration and audits, this rewarding opportunity will involve working with a fun, dedicated team of four colleagues consisting of a Kitchen Assistant, Restaurant Service Assistant, Weekend Cook/Chef and Weekend Kitchen Assistant, to deliver excellence for our residents.

Key Responsibilities

• Preparation, cooking and serving of meals, meeting company and environmental health standards. Take responsibility for particular dietary and cultural needs and cook specific meals as per the resident food profile so that resident preferences are met.
• Complete all menu tick sheets, cleaning records and handover sheets daily, record meals sold and report resident feedback to the Catering Manager.
• Issue resident catering invoices, respond to resident queries regarding payments and accrued arrears.
• Carry out health, safety and food hygiene standards checks as directed by A2Dominion catering standards and ensure all practices meet statutory regulations, including the Registered Homes Act 1984, and A2Dominion’s health & safety policy.
• Prepare and respond to inspections and audits by external authorities and other bodies and fulfil reporting requirements.
• Lead and support a small, fun dedicated team of colleagues, allocate duties and check work is completed in a timely manner. Take responsibility for managing their recruitment, probation, development, absence, staff behaviours and employment lifecycle.
• Own ordering, stock control, deliveries, agency workers’ time‑keeping and maintain the standards set by the Catering Manager.

More About You

We want you to bring your knowledge and experience to play your part in improving people’s lives:

• Ideally you will have a catering/cooking qualification and/or experience working in a care and support environment, or cooking experience for large volumes of people.
• Excellent time‑management and organisational skills in running a smooth, effective catering service for our residents.
• Have a passion for leading a team, whether you have prior experience or are looking to take the next step in your career.
• Comfortable in taking ownership of the ‘back office’ administration and documentation using basic Microsoft applications (Excel, Word, Teams, Outlook).
• Excellent English verbal and written communication skills.
• Able to commute to the housing scheme in Tilehurst, Berkshire, RG30 3NT.