Institution and Cafeteria Cooks
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Overview
Prepare and cook large quantities of food for institutions, such as schools, hospitals, or cafeterias.
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Titles for this career often contain these words
CookCafeteriaChefSpecialistDietaryFoodServiceSchoolBoardingHouseCampCulinaryAideDinnerWorkerGalleyInstitutionalKitchenLineMessPrepPreparatoryRanchShip'sSousSpecialDiet
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Responsibilities and activities

Cooks typically do the following:

  • Ensure the freshness of food and ingredients
  • Weigh, measure, and mix ingredients according to recipes
  • Bake, grill, or fry meats, fish, vegetables, and other foods
  • Boil and steam meats, fish, vegetables, and other foods
  • Arrange, garnish, and sometimes serve food
  • Clean work areas, equipment, utensils, and dishes
  • Cook, handle, and store food or ingredients

Cooks usually work under the direction of chefs, head cooks, or food service managers. Large restaurants and food service establishments often have multiple menus and large kitchen staffs. Teams of restaurant cooks, sometimes called assistant cooks or line cooks, work at assigned stations equipped with the necessary types of stoves, grills, pans, and ingredients.

Job titles often reflect the principal ingredient cooks prepare or the type of cooking they do—vegetable cook, fry cook, or grill cook, for example.

Cooks use a variety of kitchen equipment, including broilers, grills, slicers, grinders, and blenders.

The responsibilities of cooks vary depending on the type of food service establishment, the size of the facility, and the level of service offered. However, in all establishments, they follow sanitation procedures when handling food. For example, they store food and ingredients at the correct temperatures to prevent bacterial growth.

The following are examples of types of cooks:

Restaurant cooks prepare a wide selection of dishes and cook most orders individually. Some restaurant cooks may order supplies and help maintain the stock room.

Fast-food cooks prepare a limited selection of menu items in fast-food restaurants. They cook and package food, such as hamburgers and fried chicken, to be kept warm until served. For more information on workers who prepare and serve items in fast-food restaurants, see the profiles on food preparation workers and food and beverage serving and related workers.

Institution and cafeteria cooks work in the kitchens of schools, cafeterias, businesses, hospitals, and other institutions. Although they typically prepare a large quantity of a limited number of entrees, vegetables, and desserts, according to preset menus, they do sometimes customize meals according to diners’ dietary considerations.

Short-order cooks prepare foods in restaurants and coffee shops that emphasize fast service and quick food preparation. They usually prepare sandwiches, fry eggs, and cook french fries, often working on several orders at the same time.

Private household cooks, sometimes called personal chefs, plan and prepare meals in private homes, according to the client’s tastes and dietary needs. They order groceries and supplies, clean the kitchen, and wash dishes and utensils. They also may cater parties, holiday meals, luncheons, and other social events. Private household cooks typically work full-time for one client, although many are self-employed or employed by an agency, regularly making meals for multiple clients.

Salary
Median salary: $28,650 annually
Half of those employed in this career earn between $23,320 and $35,020.
$29K$0$10K$20K$30K$40K$50K
Context: Median Salary
How do salaries for this career compare to other jobs' salaries?
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Salary growth for cooks
Is this job likely to reward you for sticking with it through pay raises and promotions? The higher a job’s “experience quotient,” the more you are likely to get as you stay there.
Experience quotient percentile
Take a minute to look at how much you might expect your salary to increase with each five years' experience, as well as how the numbers working at each age change. Does this seem to be a job for the young or the old, or could it be a career offering steady salary growth for many years?
Salary distribution
$23K$23K$23K$23K$17K$23K$23K$22K$21K$0$10K$20K$30K$40K$50K20-2425-2930-3435-3940-4445-4950-5455-5960-64
Number employed
050K100K150K200K250K20-2425-2930-3435-3940-4445-4950-5455-5960-64
About Institution and Cafeteria Cooks
How do benefits for this career compare to other jobs? The availability of health care, especially employer provided health care, and pension plans can add significantly to the value of compensation you receive in a career. These charts compare how this career compares to other careers with regard to health care and pension plans.
Employee has health insurance
Employer is providing health insurance
Employer-provided pension plan is available
Worker concerns
Some jobs are more stressful than others, and some are just plain dangerous. The following list gives the percentages of institution and cafeteria cooks who report hazardous or difficult situations typically occurring at least once a week.
  • Time Pressure (86%)
  • Minor Burns, Cuts, Bites (75%)
  • Responsible for Others' Health (74%)
  • Unpleasant or Angry People (54%)
  • Consequence of Error (53%)
  • Exposed to Contaminants (42%)
  • Exposed to Disease or Infections (42%)
  • High Conflict Frequency (41%)
SOURCES:
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Personality and skills
Can you see yourself in the ranks of Institution and Cafeteria Cooks? Here are the skills and traits that could lead to success.
Comprehension
Cooks need to understand orders and follow recipes to prepare dishes correctly.
Dexterity
Cooks should have excellent hand–eye coordination. For example, they need to use proper knife techniques for cutting, chopping, and dicing.
Physical stamina
Cooks spend a lot of time standing in one place, cooking food over hot stoves, and cleaning work areas.
Sense of taste and smell
Cooks must have a keen sense of taste and smell to prepare meals that customers enjoy.
Injury and Illness
About 148 institution and cafeteria cooks become injured or ill for every 10,000 workers, making this job more dangerous than 89% of other careers. The most common specific illnesses or injuries are detailed following.
Heat (thermal) burns
Carpal tunnel syndrome
Amputations
Education pathways to this career
Education attained by institution and cafeteria cooks
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), institution and cafeteria cooks typically hold no formal educational credential.
Sometimes the typical education identified by the BLS differs a bit from the reality of the how much education current workers actually have. The donut shows the education level held by people currently working as cooks as reported in responses to the American Community Survey.
Details: Education and training recommended for institution and cafeteria cooks

Vocational cooking schools, professional culinary institutes, and some colleges offer culinary programs for aspiring cooks. These programs generally last from a few months to 2 years and may offer courses in advanced cooking techniques, international cuisines, and various cooking styles. To enter these programs, candidates may be required to have a high school diploma or equivalent. Depending on the type and length of the program, graduates generally qualify for entry-level positions as a restaurant cook.

Education level of Cooks
Only 5% of cooks have a bachelor's degree or higher.
Education attained by cooks
None
High School
Some College
Associate's Degree
Bachelor's Degree
Master's Degree
Professional Degree
Doctorate
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Programs recommended by the Department of Education
The Department of Education recommends the following college degree programs as preparation for this career. You can click a program row to learn more about the program and explore a list of schools that offer the program.
Number of degrees awarded in 2018
Education
Education level of awarded degrees
Assoc./Cert.
Bachelor's
Graduate
Gender
Gender of graduates
Men
Women
Race/Origin
Race/origin of graduates
White
Minority
International
Where are the jobs
State-by-state employment numbers
Some careers tend to be centered in specific parts of the country. For example, most jobs in fashion are in New York or California. Let's see if your dream job is easy to find in your dream location! We have a few choices for viewing the data that can help you get a full employment picture.
Select a state to see local area details
Number of Cooks per 1,000 workers (ACS)
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Job density versus job count
Which states hire the most institution and cafeteria cooks? We wonder if that's a fair question since states come in all sizes, so instead let's start with the question of which states have the highest density of people working as institution and cafeteria cooks. You can choose to view the number of jobs per state if you prefer.
Salaries by state
Let's get a feel for where institution and cafeteria cooks earn the highest salaries. There are several choices for which data we consider and how we view that data, and each can lead to different conclusions, so please read on...
Median salary versus state ratio
We use two methods to compare salaries across states:
  • In-state comparisons: the ratio of median (middle) salaries for cooks compared to the median salary for all people working in each state, or
  • Median salary: the unaltered median salaries for cooks.
We hope the ratio allows perspective about how salaries may compare to the regional cost-of-living.
The darkest shading corresponds to states in which cooks earn the highest salary when compared to other jobs in the state. We think this figure might be a better indicator than the actual salary for your buying power as a state resident.
Select a state to see local area details
Location-adjusted median salary for Cooks (ACS for all specialties)
AKMEWIVTNHWAIDMTNDMNILMINYMAORUTWYSDIAINOHPANJCTRICANVCONEMOKYWVVAMDDEAZNMKSARTNNCSCDCOKLAMSALGAHITXFLPR
Employment
40% of Cooks are working part time.
We’ve found that some jobs have a huge number of part-time workers, and typically that is because they are unable to find full-time work or the job itself can’t provide full-time hours. With 40% part-time workers, this occupation has a higher percentage of part-time workers than 90% of careers.
40%0%20%40%60%80%100%
Employer types
This donut shares the break-down of workers by employer type, giving us a picture of what employers most typically hire for this career.
Employers of undefined (ACS)
Private for-profit
Private not-for-profit
Local government
State government
Federal government
Self-employed incorporated
Self-employed not incorporated
Working without pay
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Distribution: Salaries of cooks by type of employer
Here are the salary distributions based on employer type.
$21K$21K$20K$20K$27K$26K$23K$21K$19K$0$20,000$40,000$60,000$80,000Working without paySelf-employed not incorporatedSelf-employed incorporatedFederal governmentState governmentLocal governmentPrivate not-for-profitPrivate for-profitAll
Gender
Cooks and gender
With 37% women, this occupation has a lower percentage of women than 50% of careers.
Gender of Cooks
Men (63%)
Women (37%)
Distribution: salaries by gender
Does gender greatly influence your salary in this career? The closer the bars are, the less discrepancy there is.
$20K$22K$0$100K$200K$300KWomenMen
We only include salary data when the survey error is less than 20%, so you may see only partial information for some categories.
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Context: Women in the workforce
How does this career compare to other careers with regard to the percentage of women in the career.
37%0%20%40%60%80%100%
Context: Salary inequity
The median salary for all full-time male workers in the US exceeds the full-time median salary for women by 19%. The situation is a little better for cooks, with the median salary for men 12% higher than the median salary for women.
12%0%20%40%60%80%100%
Race/Origin
Race and origin of Cooks
This donut shows the distribution of race and origin among those employed as Cooks.
Race/origin of cooks
White (58% )
Black (17% )
Other (13% )
Asian (6% )
Multiracial (3% )
Hispanic (1% )
American Indian (1% )
Pacific Islander (0% )
Distribution: salaries by race/origin
Some careers might have a pay disparity based on race or origin, the closer the below bars are the less of a discrepancy is present.
$20K$21K$21K$21K$21K$23K$23K$24K$0$10K$20K$30K$40K$50KBlackAmerican IndianMultiracialWhiteHispanicOtherPacific IslanderAsian
We only include salary data when the survey error is less than 20%, so you may see only partial information for some categories.