Trained in the art of making pastries, desserts, bread, and other delectable baked goods, a pastry chef is an essential employee in a bakery. There are all sorts of food businesses that need to hire pastry chefs including restaurants, catering companies, grocery stores, and bistros.

The pastry chef in a professional kitchen typically manages a smaller team of bakers in training in addition to serving as quality assurance before product is put in a display case or delivered to customers. In smaller kitchens with less staff, this person could be the head-baker, pan washer, and pretty much every hat in the bakery. A pastry chef creates cakes, pastries, pies, candies, chocolates, custards, ice cream, and bread, among other things, as well as ordering the required stock, keeping inventory, dealing with the wholesalers, and developing exciting new recipes for customers.

Would you hire one of these guys?

Characteristics of top pastry chefs include attention to detail and formal training like a baking and pastry arts or culinary arts degree. But this is not always a requirement and many entry-level pastry chefs get on the job training or were self taught.

If you plan to hire a new pastry chef, but don’t want to go through all the hassle of writing out a long and complex job description, I’ve got you covered. You can use this pastry chef job description to post on job websites and attract your next rock-star employee.

Fresh baked bread.

Introduction

The pastry chef’s responsibilities might include creating the cakes and pastries. In addition to baking there are a variety of administrative tasks that comes along with the role, including ordering supplies like flour, sugar, and frosting. The role could also include trouble-shooting baking equipment, training in new hires, cleaning the kitchen, and of course providing exceptional customer service.

Without a pastry chef, a restaurant would not be able to put out cakes, fresh bread, custards, and other delicious treats for desserts. But as you can see there’s much more that goes into this role than the baking part.

Job Description Summary

The best way to begin any job ad is to start with a summary of your business and what you are looking for in an employee. Here is a professional job description example for a pastry chef.

“The renowned Brioche Restaurant, a premiere establishment in the heart of the city with a wide-ranging menu of delightful freshly-cooked dishes and entrees, is one of the most popular restaurants in the city, with a well-earned reputation for fine cuisine, excellent service, and a refined experience.

We now have an opening for a Pastry Chef for our pastry station, responsible for a small but professional team of pastry chefs and bakers. Applicants should have good management skills, understand the inner workings of a professional kitchen, and be able to manage ordering, inventory, and stock control to ensure that the menu requirements are consistently met.”

At this stage, only the basic details are given, drawing the applicants in to read on and learn more about the role. Similar to marketing, its essential to draw the applicants to the main body of your position with an enticing introduction.

Primary Responsibilities

You always want to be clear on the full list of responsibilities of a job. You want someone that is clear on what the day-to-day duties will be.

  • Able to develop, design, or creates new ideas and items for Pastry Kitchen
  • Able to produce all baked goods including but not limited to artisan breads and rolls, muffins, laminated Danish, laminated croissants and doughnuts etc.
  • Assists in determining how food should be presented and creates decorative food displays
  • Checks the quality of raw and cooked food products to ensure that standards are met
  • Coordinates activities of cooks and workers engaged in food preparation
  • Create new and exciting desserts to renew menus and engage the interest of customers
  • Decorate pastries and desserts using different types of icings, toppings etc. and ensure the food presentation will be beautiful and exciting

Related Reading: Head Chef Job Description Sample: Copy, Paste and Edit for Free

  • Ensure compliance with food hygiene and Health and Safety standards.
  • Follows proper handling and right temperature of all food products.
  • Maintain a lean and orderly cooking station and adhere to health and safety standards.
  • Maintains cleanliness and organization in all work areas.
  • Manages all day-to-day operations of the pastry and bakery section of the kitchen.
  • Monitor stock for baking ingredients such as flour, sugar etc. and make appropriate orders within budget.
  • Operate and maintain all department equipment and report malfunctions.
  • Prepare a wide variety of goods such as cakes, cookies, pies, bread etc. following traditional and modern recipes
  • Supervise and coordinate all pastry and dessert preparation / presentation

This is not an all-inclusive list of the primary responsibilities. You can edit or add to this list to suit the needs of your business.

Desired Skills / Role Requirements

This is the section where you can let the applicants know what qualifications, experience, and skills you feel are important for a pastry chef position.

  • Two or more years of experience working in the food industry.
  • Applicable knowledge of baking with ingredient limitations (pastries that are gluten free, sugarless etc.).
  • Certificate in culinary arts, pastry-making, baking or relevant field.
  • Creative ability with artistic skill in decorating cakes and other desserts.
  • Excellent organizational and time management skills.
  • Flexible about working hours, including weekends and evenings, when necessary.
  • Great attention to detail and creativity.
  • Great interpersonal and leadership skills.
  • In depth knowledge of sanitation principles, food preparation and baking techniques and nutrition.
  • Previous working experience as Pastry Chef.
  • Strong passion for the art of food design.
  • Working knowledge of baking techniques and the pastry-making process.

Sample Job Description Template

To help get a job ad live and spend less time thinking about what you should include, here is a sample template that you can copy and use for a pastry chef job description.

The Brioche Loaf Restaurant – Experienced/Qualified Pastry Chef required

As a premiere restaurant in the heart of the city, The Brioche Loaf is the place to be for that refined dining experience, the finest foods and cuisines, and the best in service. Our exciting and varied menu covers a delightfully complex range of cuisines to suit almost any palate, and our specialist breads are the talk of the town. We firmly believe that our customers deserve the very best.

We are now looking for a new pastry chef for our pastry, bread, and dessert station, who will be able to manage the requirements and continue to produce pastries and desserts to the highest quality. As well as being able to produce exciting new and favored recipes for our dessert menu, the successful applicant will be knowledgeable in all aspects of food handling and preparation, creative and adventurous in new styles, designs, and recipes, and be able to manage the day-to-day operations of our busy pastry station.

You will need to become an expert on our current pastry, bread, and dessert menu, as well as be expected to come up with new and exciting ideas to add to our popular menu items, and satisfy customer expectations.

Responsibilities:

Here is a sample list of responsibilities for a pastry chef.

  • Able to develop, design, or creates new ideas and items for bakery.
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