Cooking up a rewarding career as a chef

By Jeffrey Steele, Special Advertising Sections Writer

Stephanie Goldfarb was selling memberships at a Los Angeles fitness center when she decided to enroll in culinary arts school in 2002.

“I always cooked for my friends and family, and I just thought, ‘Why not enhance my skills and really learn what I’m doing?’.” she said.

After finishing the Pro Chef I course at Epicurean School of Culinary Arts in Los Angeles, Goldfarb started a catering business, which led to her being hired as the personal chef for a major entertainment figure.

The 36-year-old still caters some private parties and special events on the side.

“I enjoyed the class thoroughly, and it basically fine-tuned what I knew and added a repertoire of amazing techniques,” she said. “The professional chef course at Epicurean was a traditional French cuisine course, [where you learn] all the stocks, sauces and the pate [and] even how to bone a chicken. We learned everything.”

Goldfarb has no regrets about her move into the culinary arts and encourages others with a love for food and cooking to consider a culinary arts education as well.

“In anything you do, if you’re passionate and love what you do, success will follow,” she said.

Strong demand for skills

Culinary school graduates are likely to find a strong demand for their skills from a wide range of employers. According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, job openings for chefs, cooks and food-preparation workers are expected to be abundant through 2010. The growth will result from new openings in the restaurant and hospitality industries, as well as from the need to replace workers who leave this enormous occupational group, said BLS representatives.

“There are lots of opportunities,” said Leticia Tiñon, graduate employment advisor for the culinary arts program of the Art Institute of California, which has campuses in Santa Monica, Santa Ana and San Diego. “We have more employers calling us than graduates. More than 50% of students in both the associate’s and bachelor’s degree programs are working [even] before they [graduate].”

Many who earn the Art Institute of California’s associate of science degree in culinary arts or bachelor of science degree in culinary management go to work in restaurants and hotels, while others become private chefs or food stylists, who prepare food for photography for print ads, TV commercials and the like, Tiñon said. They also find jobs in country clubs, Las Vegas casinos, retirement communities, hospitals and universities and on cruise ships.

Duddana Watt, 53, who earned her associate degree from the Art Institute of California in December, went on to work as a pastry chef at Catalina Island Country Club, where she also served an externship. (With an externship, a student receives pay for working in the field of study and is promised continuation of the position after graduation.)

Watt said she also hopes to expand her own catering company, which she currently runs on a part-time basis. She caters birthday parties and wedding receptions for 35 to 200, and also prepares crew dinners for movie sets and bands.

It’s a far cry from her earlier three careers: travel agent, general manager of a Discovery Bay hotel on her native island of Jamaica and administrative assistant in the marketing department of the Georgia Lottery.

Change careers in mid-life

Mid-life career changers like Watt are not unusual in this field.

“I hear this every day,” said Shelly Janson, director of the Epicurean School of Culinary Arts, which offers Pro Chef I and Prof Chef II certificates. “People call and they’re very squeamish, and they go, ‘I’m 35 or I’m 42, and I’ve been doing this and I don’t like it, but I’ve always loved cooking. Do you think it’s too late for me?’ And I just encourage them because I feel if you finally find your passion in life, you’ll make it happen. Go up there and take a shot — see what happens.”

No matter how talented they are, most graduates of culinary arts programs who go to work at restaurants have to pay their dues in the field for a few years.

“You cannot leave any school and go right to being an executive chef,” Janson said. “No one’s going to hire you to do that. You start as a line chef, and go through the line until you get to sous chef, which is kind of like second in command [to executive chef].”

At first, culinary school graduates aren’t likely to earn much more than those who have considerable kitchen skills but no formal training, said Sean Ryan, an instructor who teaches classes in management, restaurant operations and wine in the culinary arts program of the Art Institute’s Santa Monica campus.

But chefs that graduate from culinary school often have more options — and potential earning power — because they have also been taught about the business of owning, operating and managing restaurants, Ryan said.

Los Angeles area programs are different in both the training they offer and the tuition they charge. For instance, at the Epicurean School of Culinary Arts, students in the Pro Chef I certificate program attend class weekly for six months. After earning certificates of completion, they may go on to the Pro Chef II program, which meets once a week for 10 weeks.

As Goldfarb noted, Pro Chef I focuses on classic French cuisine. Pro Chef II teaches techniques for contemporary Californian and ethnic cuisines. The cost of taking Pro Chef I is $2,200, while Pro Chef II costs $1,000.

The Art Institute of California’s associate of science degree in culinary arts is a seven-quarter program for which students pay $42,000 for tuition and supplies. The bachelor of science degree in culinary management, a 12-quarter program costs about $70,000 for tuition and supplies, according to Sue Hinkin, dean of career services.

The salary range of graduates is very broad, according to Hinkin and Tiñon. Beginning line chefs may make as little as $24,000 a year, but can move up to annual salaries of about $70,000 as an executive chef.

To improve the odds of success, it’s necessary to not only master the technical skills, but to possess a number of personal attributes as well.

“Chefs need to be well-rounded,” said Haley Nguyen, who teaches courses in Southeast Asian cuisine at the Santa Monica and Santa Ana campuses of the Art Institute of California.

“They need to work well with others and be a little of an entertainer to be successful in this industry,” she said.

Also worth noting is that restaurant owners tend to value those who work very hard, Nguyen added.

“Along with that comes long hours and the willingness to do just about anything,” she said. “If you work in the kitchen, you need to be willing to do dishes and even sweep occasionally.”

Successful chefs tend not to be in it for the money, but for the love of preparing memorable cuisine.

“This is an industry where people are very frequently overworked and underpaid,” Janson said. “You need to be doing it for the passion. Sometimes it works out that you make a lot of money, but sometimes it doesn’t.”

Neither that reality nor the $41,000 he will pay for 15 months of culinary arts education bothers 37-year-old Onil Chibas. Monday, the former production supervisor at Glendale-based Dreamworks started at the California School of Culinary Arts in Pasadena to pursue an associate of occupational studies degree.

“I’m really thrilled about it. I haven’t been this excited about anything for a long time,” Chibas said. “I’d like to be an executive chef and then have my show on the Food Network. I’d like to run a restaurant, and possibly have my own restaurant.”

Jeffrey Steele is a freelance writer based in Chicago.

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