Sous chef screening questions: running the line, food cost, ordering and food safety management
On this page
- Match the kitchen first
- Food protection manager certification
- Knockout questions
- Running the line
- Ordering, inventory and food cost
- People: scheduling, training and discipline
- Food safety and inspections
- A 20-minute phone-screen flow
- How sous chef experience gets overstated
- Legal cautions
- Questions people ask
Sous chef screening questions should find out whether the candidate has run a kitchen when the chef was not there, not just cooked well in one. Ask what volume they ran, how many cooks they led, what they ordered and how they kept food cost, how they wrote schedules and prep lists, and whether they hold a food protection manager certification. Strong sous chefs answer with covers, percentages, par levels and a story about a night that went wrong. Line cooks stretching into the title answer with the stations they cooked on.
For the cooks who will work under this person, use line cook screening questions, which cover stations, ticket times and food handler cards. For the front-of-house and business side of the restaurant, use restaurant general manager screening questions.
Match the kitchen first
A sous chef in a 60-seat scratch kitchen, one in a 400-cover hotel banquet operation and one in a multi-unit restaurant group running standardized recipes do different jobs. Before the call, ask the chef: covers on a busy night, how many cooks per shift, whether the sous chef orders and to what budget, who writes the schedule, whether there is a second sous chef, and whether the kitchen is scratch, partly prepared or banquet. Then screen against that kitchen.
Food protection manager certification
The FDA Food Code, which states and localities adopt in different versions, says at least one employee with supervisory and management responsibility, and authority to direct food preparation, must be a Certified Food Protection Manager who passed a test in an accredited program. Kitchens often want the sous chef certified, so a certified manager is on duty when the chef is off. ServSafe Manager is one such certification; ServSafe says it is valid for five years, while state or local rules may require recertification sooner. Some jurisdictions also issue their own manager card or license on top. Ask the local health department.
Knockout questions
| Question | What a strong answer sounds like | Red flags |
|---|---|---|
| 1. Do you hold a food protection manager certification, and when does it expire? | "ServSafe Manager, renewed last year." Offers to send the certificate. | Confuses a food handler card with a manager certification. Expired with no plan, for a kitchen that needs it on day one. |
| 2. What is the most covers you have run as the person in charge of the kitchen, and how often? | "About 250 on Saturdays, running the pass when the chef was off, most weekends for a year." | Cooked at that volume but never ran the kitchen. |
| 3. How many cooks reported to you on a shift? | A number and roles: "Five on the line, two prep, a dishwasher." | "We were a team," and nobody reported to them. |
| 4. The schedule is [days, hours, closing nights, holidays]. Can you work it? | Yes, with any fixed conflicts named now. | No weekends, for a kitchen whose weekends are its business. |
Running the line
| Question | What a strong answer sounds like | Red flags |
|---|---|---|
| 5. Tell me about the worst service you ran. What went wrong and what did you do? | A specific night: a cook walked out, a delivery missed, a ticket rush. Concrete moves: moved people, simplified a dish, called tickets differently, talked to the front of house. | Blames others and describes no action. Or "I just cooked faster." |
| 6. How do you run the pass on a busy night? | Calls tickets, times courses, checks every plate against the spec, sends back what is wrong, keeps communication with servers short. | Has never run the pass, only a station. |
| 7. How do you check the line is ready before service? | A line check: temperatures, mise en place against pars, tasting sauces, labels and dates, backups ready. | No routine. "The cooks know what they need." |
Ordering, inventory and food cost
| Question | What a strong answer sounds like | Red flags |
|---|---|---|
| 8. What was your food cost target, and where did you usually land? | A percentage and how it was calculated (usually cost of goods over food sales for the period), and what moved it. | Does not know the number. "The chef handled costs." |
| 9. Walk me through how you placed an order. | Inventory or par sheet, upcoming covers and events, what is on hand, order guide by vendor, checking deliveries against invoices on arrival. | Orders by eye with no par or count. |
| 10. Tell me about a time food cost went up. What did you find and change? | A cause and a fix: waste on one prep item, portioning drift, a price increase, and a menu or portion change. | No example, or only "we raised prices." |
| 11. How did you cost a new dish? | Recipe costing by ingredient and yield, a target plate cost, and the menu price the chef or owner set. | Has never costed a recipe. |
People: scheduling, training and discipline
| Question | What a strong answer sounds like | Red flags |
|---|---|---|
| 12. How did you build the weekly kitchen schedule, and what labor target did you work to? | Covers forecast, skill mix by station, a labor budget or hours target, and how they handled call-outs. | Never wrote a schedule, for a role that owns it. |
| 13. How do you train a new cook on a station? | Recipe cards and specs, shadowing, a checkout on the station before they work it alone, feedback during service. | "Throw them on and see." |
| 14. Tell me about a cook whose performance you had to address. | A specific issue, a private conversation, a clear expectation, documentation and the outcome. | Yelling on the line described as leadership. Nothing documented. |
Food safety and inspections
| Question | What a strong answer sounds like | Red flags |
|---|---|---|
| 15. How did your kitchen keep temperature and cooling logs, and who checked them? | Logs at set times, cooling checked at the stages the health code requires, the sous chef reviewing and correcting. | Logs filled in at the end of the shift from memory. |
| 16. What happened at your last health inspection? | The result, any violations and what they changed afterwards. | Cannot remember, or blames the inspector. |
| 17. How do you handle an allergy order from ticket to table? | Flagged on the ticket, a dedicated clean set-up, one cook responsible, checked at the pass, delivered separately. | "We just leave the nuts off." |
A 20-minute phone-screen flow
- Minutes 0 to 2: the kitchen: concept, covers, team size, schedule, pay and who they report to.
- Minutes 2 to 5: knockouts 1 to 4.
- Minutes 5 to 10: the worst-service question and one other line question.
- Minutes 10 to 15: food cost and ordering, questions 8 to 10.
- Minutes 15 to 20: one people question, one food safety question, then the paid stage.
For the stage itself, give the candidate a management task as well as cooking, such as writing the next day's prep list from a par sheet, and pay for the time. How to run a job trial day covers how to make it fair and comparable.
How sous chef experience gets overstated
- Title without authority. Some kitchens give the title to the senior line cook. Ask what they ordered, scheduled and signed off.
- Food cost from the owner. A percentage quoted from the P&L they saw, not one they managed. Ask what they changed to move it.
- Volume from the building. Hotel covers across outlets described as their own kitchen.
- Running the pass occasionally. Once a month on the chef's day off described as running the kitchen. Ask how often.
Legal cautions
Kitchen hiring conversations are informal, which is where unlawful questions slip in. Ask whether the candidate can work the schedule, not about children or religion; if they raise a religious observance, it is an accommodation question for later. Ask whether they can perform the job's physical duties, such as standing for long shifts and lifting stock, with or without accommodation, not about injuries. Do not ask about immigration status beyond the lawful work authorization question asked of everyone. Leadership judgment is covered in how to interview for leadership roles, and the full list of questions to avoid is in illegal interview questions.
Questions people ask
Does a sous chef need a food protection manager certification?
Often, yes. The FDA Food Code, which states and localities adopt in different versions, says at least one employee with supervisory and management responsibility must be a Certified Food Protection Manager who passed a test in an accredited program. Kitchens frequently expect the sous chef to hold it so a certified manager is on duty when the chef is off. Check the local health department's rule.
How long is a ServSafe Manager certification valid?
ServSafe says its manager certification is valid for five years, and that state or local rules and employer standards may set a different recertification requirement. Ask for the certificate date and check it before the start date.
What separates a sous chef from a strong line cook?
Responsibility for other people's work. A sous chef runs the pass or the line when the chef is away, writes the prep list, orders, schedules and trains cooks, and answers for food cost and inspections. A strong line cook masters a station. The screen should test the management work, not only cooking.
Should a sous chef candidate do a working interview?
A paid stage or trial shift is common and useful. If the candidate produces food or works a service for the business, treat it as paid work under wage-and-hour law. Give them a management task as well as cooking, such as writing the next day's prep list from the par sheet.