Chef resume guide — culinary CVs for hotels, cruise, and private kitchens
How to write a chef CV that passes hotel ATS: stations, HACCP, covers, and bullet formulas for line cook through executive sous.
A chef resume (or culinary CV) has to satisfy two readers: an ATS that hotels and cruise lines use to filter certificates and titles, and a chef or F&B manager who skims for stations, volume, and whether you will survive a busy pass.
Structure that kitchen ATS can parse
Use a single-column layout with standard headings: Contact, Summary, Experience, Education / culinary training, Skills, Certifications. Avoid multi-column Canva layouts for portal uploads — beautiful PDFs often scramble dates and titles.
Put food-safety credentials near the top: HACCP, ServSafe, local food-hygiene certificates, allergen training. Many hotel groups filter on them before a human opens the file.
Summary and experience bullets that sound like a kitchen
Summary: two or three lines with title, years, cuisine or outlet focus, and your largest volume (covers, banquet size, or vessel). Example tone: "Sous chef — hotel banquet and à la carte — HACCP audits passed — trained juniors on grill and sauté."
Bullets need owned verbs plus scope: covers per service, ticket-time targets, banquet headcount, juniors trained, audit outcomes, waste or ordering improvements. Prefer "Ran grill for 220-cover dinner service" over "Responsible for food preparation in a fast-paced environment."
Skip corporate jargon that does not travel in kitchens — synergy, stakeholder alignment, cross-functional excellence. Station names and hygiene language travel better.
Sample bullet patterns (rewrite with your numbers)
Volume: "Held sauté for dinner service averaging [X] covers; kept ticket times under [Y] minutes on Friday peaks."
Leadership: "Trained [N] junior cooks on mise en place and station setup; cut prep overtime by ~[Z] hours/week in banquet season."
Compliance: "Passed [N] consecutive HACCP / hygiene audits with zero critical findings; updated allergen labelling for a [N]-item menu."
Banquet: "Supported plating for events up to [N] guests, coordinating hot and cold pass timing with F&B captains."
Tailor by lane: hotel, cruise, private
Hotel and resort: outlets, banquet capacity, brand standards, multi-cuisine flexibility.
Cruise and large vessels: volume, hygiene audits, dietary variety, working in confined galleys with rotating menus.
Private chef / yacht / estate: discretion (never name clients), dietary customization, provisioning logistics, household coordination.
Common mistakes
Listing every station you briefly touched as "expert" — trials expose empty claims.
Burying food-safety certificates on page two while stuffing soft skills in the summary.
Using US-only "resume" norms for AU/NZ Seek roles without AU spelling or work-rights line when useful.
Fix order before you apply
Examples and next steps
Browse role samples: Chef · Sous Chef · Line Cook · Pastry Chef · Private Chef
Templates: Chef · Hospitality Hospitality FOH guide: Hospitality Cv Guide Builder: Signup ATS checker: Ats Resume Checker Explained