Head Cook

Brattleboro Food Co-op; Brattleboro (VT); On-site; USD 40,000 - 60,000; Full time

Job summary

Brattleboro Food Co-op is seeking a professional cook/food service lead to ensure efficient daily workflow and dining operations. You will prepare products, oversee production systems, and maintain exceptional presentation of meal services while supporting the Food Services Director.

Ideal candidates have 3–5 years of professional cooking experience, strong leadership, and a solid grasp of food safety and teamwork in a fast-paced environment.

Qualifications

• 3–5 years professional cooking experience in line, fine dining, culinary education, or catering production.
• Strong leadership abilities
• Good communication and teamwork
• Able to lift 50 pounds and work in a fast-paced environment
• Detail-oriented and thorough
• Able to follow safety and sanitation standards

Responsibilities

• Prepare menu items and ensure timely serving.
• Oversee production and service periods with the manager.
• Maintain cleanliness of work stations and kitchen.
• Assist the Food Services Director when offsite or unavailable.
• Coordinate with the manager to minimize waste and meet clientele needs.

Skills

Leadership

Communication

Culinary skills

Teamwork

Job description

Description

Why work for us?

We are 50 years strong in the community.

We give back to organizations with shared values.

We offer great benefits and competitive compensation.

We are continually innovating and investing in the future.

We offer opportunities for personal and professional growth; about half of our managers were promoted from within.

Tired of working for a company that leaves you feeling like you’re not appreciated? Would you like to join a team that actually enjoys what they do and believes in making a difference?

The Brattleboro Food Co-op is owned by thousands of local shareholders and is committed to improving the quality of life for our community, one meal at a time. We offer competitive wages, great benefits, and an excellent work-life balance.

Purpose: To assist in ensuring, facilitating, and maintaining efficient daily workflow and dining operations. To prepare products, and maintain production systems; to oversee the exceptional presentation of any and all meal services; and to assist the Food Services Director in meeting goals. To oversee staff when the Food Services Director is offsite, and be available to clientele in any capacity required.

Status: Reports to Food Services Director

Customer Service:

• Assists customers with questions in a prompt and courteous manner
• Provide attentive and courteous customer service
• Maintain a polite, friendly and helpful attitude towards internal and external customers
• Be proficient and knowledgeable in all facets of operations

Product Knowledge:

• Knowledgeable about all products. Continues to learn about new products. Answers questions accurately
• Maintain, understand, and facilitate use of all systems in place
• Remain informed on the event calendar, and available products and services
• Product Presentation and Quality:
• Ensure quality food preparation, presentation and execution

Safety:

• Handles all equipment in a safe manner
• Alert to unsafe equipment and removes any equipment that is unsafe from usage
• Teamwork:
• Ensures department teamwork through trust and communication
• Provide and maintain training as needed
• Assign work lists, evaluate efficiencies, perform regular follow-up using policy and other tools provided as set out by procedural guidelines

Accountability:

• Accepts responsibility for personal decisions and actions. Exemplifies honesty, integrity and ethics
• Contributes constructively to the morale of the department
• Ensures cleanliness standards and ensures the production needs of the kitchen, service periods, and events are met.
• Shows initiative in solving issues and achieving the departmental goals

Job Specific Functions:

• Ensure menu items and back ups are prepared and ready to go out at the appropriate time
• Coordinate with the manager to ensure all items from previous meals are being utilized in an efficient manner, to minimize general waste, and ensure clientele’s needs are met
• Be available to clientele to answer questions concerning products, ingredients, time tables, and the events calendar
• Oversee the cleanliness, production, and par of any customer facing service areas and to delegate these duties as necessary
• Ensure the cookie cabinet, staff snacks, and any other daily offers or grab and go areas remain stocked
• Facilitate the execution of service periods, and production
• Ensure proper rotation of products, monitor product dates, and maintain proper signage, amd product storage in cooperation with the manager
• Oversee arranging production sheets and planning, and facilitate production and service periods for the day in cooperation with the manager
• Preparation of all menu items promptly and efficiently as assigned
• Ensure and facilitate kitchen cleanliness as needed or assigned
• Ensure that equipment is well maintained, and to notify appropriate personnel of any equipment failures or malfunctions in a timely fashion
• Ensure high quality of products, and quality standards
• Utilization of logbooks, temperature logs, refrigeration logs and other work templates used
• Maintain clean and orderly work stations
• Plan and participate in cleaning projects as assigned
• Adhering to the site’s code of conduct as defined during training
• Provide training to new team members as assigned
• Adhere to established safety and sanitation standards
• Accurately inputting shrink data as needed
• Maintaining clean and orderly work stations
• Adhering to the site code of conduct as defined during training
• Other duties as assigned

Requirements

• Self-motivated, organized, responsible, flexible
• Effective communication skills
• Professional cooking experience; 3-5 years practical application. Line work, fine dining, culinary education, and catering production; large scale food service culinary production experience highly preferred.
• Relevant leadership skills
• Quick and proficient cooking skills, knife work, and an understanding of large scale production
• Ability to lift 50 pounds
• Ability to understand and follow directions
• Ability to understand and meet standards for health, safety, and excellence
• Ability to remain alert and focused in an environment that is noisy and fast-paced
• Ability to work effectively within a team
• Detail-oriented and thorough

At Brattleboro Food Co-op, we do not just accept difference — we celebrate it, we support it, and we thrive on it for the benefit of our employees, our products, and our community. Brattleboro Food Co-op is proud to be an equal opportunity employer.