Head Chef – Clubhouse, Restaurant & Events

Maldon & Tiptree FC; Maldon; On-site; GBP 30,000 - 40,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

On-site parking

Job summary

Maldon & Tiptree Football Club is expanding its in-house dining with a hands-on Head Chef to shape the menu and kitchen operations across restaurant and events. You’ll work with the Site Manager to craft menus, manage prep and service, and oversee catering for private events and matchdays in a growing, gastropub-style setting.

The role offers the chance to build from ground up, negotiate hours, and shape a distinct food concept for fans and local diners alike.

Qualifications

• Gastropub/kitchen experience
• Menu development experience
• Strong leadership in busy kitchen
• Costing and margin awareness
• Experience with events/catering

Responsibilities

• Create and evolve the restaurant menu and food offering
• Cook and present high-quality dishes
• Develop specials and seasonal dishes
• Manage kitchen prep, service and staffing
• Oversee food for private events and matchdays
• Coordinate catering for events with dietary requirements
• Ensure food hygiene and safety standards

Job description

Head Chef – Clubhouse, Restaurant & Events

Maldon & Tiptree Football Club

Job type: Full-time

Salary: Negotiable, depending on experience

Hours: Full-time, with exact hours and working pattern negotiable

Start date: Immediate

The opportunity

Maldon & Tiptree Football Club is launching a new clubhouse restaurant and we're looking for a talented, hands-on Head Chef to help us build the food offering from the ground up.

Our vision is to create a welcoming restaurant serving modern gastropub-style food — generous, high-quality, crowd-pleasing dishes with strong flavours and great presentation.

Think excellent burgers and wings, grills, sharing plates, loaded sides, hearty mains and regularly changing specials.

Familiar food, elevated and done exceptionally well.

We're not looking for fine dining, nor do we want a typical football-club food offering. We want to create somewhere people choose to eat because the food is genuinely good — whether there's a match on or not.

The successful chef will have genuine input into developing the menu, kitchen operation and overall direction of the food offering.

Our facilities include a fully equipped commercial kitchen, food truck and fast-food kiosk, allowing us to develop different offerings across restaurant dining, private events and matchdays.

The role

You’ll take day-to-day responsibility for the kitchen and help us build a food operation that is high quality, consistent and commercially successful.

You’ll work closely with the Site / Venue Manager and wider operations team to develop menus and organise preparation, staffing and service.

Alongside the restaurant, you’ll oversee food for private events and matchdays, adapting the offering appropriately for everything from busy football crowds to private functions.

Key responsibilities

• Create and continually develop the restaurant's menu and overall food offering.
• Prepare, cook and present consistently high-quality food.
• Develop specials, seasonal dishes and new menu ideas.
• Maintain high standards of taste, presentation and consistency.
• Cost dishes and maintain sensible commercial margins.
• Organise daily preparation and manage kitchen service.
• Determine kitchen staffing requirements and plan rotas.
• Recruit, train and lead additional kitchen staff as the operation grows.
• Manage ordering, deliveries, stock rotation and stock counts.
• Control portions, food costs and waste.
• Oversee food production across the main kitchen, food truck and matchday kiosk.
• Develop menus and catering packages for private events and functions.
• Coordinate event catering, quantities, dietary requirements and service timings.
• Maintain excellent food hygiene, allergen controls, cleaning schedules and kitchen records.
• Work closely with front-of-house and the wider club team to deliver excellent service.

What we're looking for

We're looking for someone who is excited by the opportunity to build something, rather than simply walk into an established kitchen and follow an existing menu.

You may already be a Head Chef, or you could be an experienced Sous Chef or chef who is ready to take the next step and make a kitchen their own.

Ideally, you'll have:

• Experience in a gastropub, quality pub kitchen, restaurant or similarly busy professional kitchen.
• A passion for producing excellent, accessible food.
• A good understanding of flavours, presentation and consistency.
• Confidence managing preparation and busy services.
• Experience organising and leading kitchen staff.
• An understanding of menu development and dish costing.
• Good commercial awareness around margins, stock management, portion control and waste.
• Strong knowledge of food hygiene, allergens and safe food handling.
• Good organisation, communication and leadership.
• Flexibility around evenings, weekends, matchdays and private events.
• Experience in event catering, high-volume service or helping launch a new restaurant would be an advantage, but we're more interested in finding the right person than someone who ticks every box.

What we're building

The restaurant will sit at the heart of Maldon & Tiptree Football Club, but you don't need to be a football fan to want to eat here.

Our ambition is to create a genuine local food destination that operates throughout the week and becomes known for great food, a relaxed atmosphere and good value.

Matchdays bring a ready-made audience, but we're equally interested in attracting families, local residents, businesses and people looking for somewhere good to eat.

Private events and functions will also form an important part of the operation.

For the right chef, this is an opportunity to have significant influence over what that becomes.

The package

This is a full-time position, but we're deliberately keeping the package flexible.

Salary, exact hours, working pattern, rota, responsibilities and start date are all negotiable depending on the experience and circumstances of the successful candidate.

For an exceptional candidate, we're open to discussing how the role and package could be structured.

Pay: £30,000.00-£40,000.00 per year

Benefits

• On-site parking

Work Location: In person