Questions to Ask a Cook in an Interview
These are questions to ask a line cook in an interview, written for the chef, kitchen manager or owner doing the hiring, and most of them carry over to a prep, grill or breakfast cook. They run in the order the conversation usually takes: background, prep, service on the line, food safety, the team, then hours, pay and next steps. If you are the cook and want to know what to ask in a cooking interview yourself, the guide ends with the questions worth asking back.
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The questions
Each question, and why to ask it
Background
Where have you cooked, and what was the cover count on a busy night?
Why ask it
Covers per service calibrates their experience better than a restaurant's reputation does. Someone from a forty cover room may be excellent but will feel the volume of a two hundred cover service.
What station are you strongest on, and which one would you rather not work?
Why ask it
Strong cooks answer both halves without hedging. A candidate who claims every station equally is usually protecting a weakness you will discover on a Friday night instead of today.
What was on the menu at your last job, and how much of it was made in house?
Why ask it
A kitchen that makes its own stocks, sauces and dressings trains different habits from one that opens bags and portions. Neither answer rules a cook out, but it tells you how much of your prep list will be new to them.
Which equipment have you worked on: flat top, chargrill, fryers, combi oven, salamander?
Why ask it
Name the pieces your own line runs on and see which ones they have real stories about. A cook who has never touched your main piece of equipment needs a slower first week, which is easy to plan for and painful to find out mid service.
Is there a dish from your last menu you could cook for me right now without looking anything up?
Why ask it
Have them talk it through from the pan to the plate. The detail, such as heat, timing, seasoning and what the finished plate looks like, shows how much of the last job stayed in their hands.
Did you learn to cook at culinary school, on the job, or both?
Why ask it
School tends to give vocabulary and technique, and years on a line give speed and a feel for volume. Ask what the other route would have taught them, since a cook who can name the gap is usually working on it.
Why did you leave your last kitchen, or why are you looking to leave now?
Why ask it
Cut hours, a closure, a long commute and wanting to learn a new cuisine are everyday reasons. Notice whether the story is about the work or about a person, and whether a difficult chef turns up in every job on the resume.
What do you cook for yourself on a day off?
Why ask it
There is no wrong answer, and plenty of good cooks eat cereal at midnight. You are checking for curiosity about food, which is what carries someone through the tenth identical order of the night.
What kind of kitchen do you want to be working in two years from now?
Why ask it
Someone aiming at a sous chef job, a bakery or a truck of their own will each want something different from a year on your line. A stopgap hire can still be a good one, as long as you know it before you plan six months of training around them.
Prep
Walk me through your prep list on a normal day. What do you start with?
Why ask it
Prep order is the clearest window into how someone thinks: stocks and long cooks first, garnishes last. A candidate who lists tasks in no particular order tends to run behind on the line.
How do you like your mise en place set up before service?
Why ask it
Mise setups are personal and very specific, so a real answer arrives quickly and in detail. Hesitation suggests they have been handed a prepped station rather than building their own.
Do you bring your own knives, and how do you keep them sharp?
Why ask it
Anyone who looks after their own knives will mention a stone, a steel or a sharpening service without being pushed. If your kitchen supplies house knives, say so, and say who looks after them.
If the recipe makes four litres and I need twenty, how do you scale it?
Why ask it
Multiplying is the easy part. Someone who has done it for real will add that salt, spice and thickeners need tasting on the way up, and that a bigger pot takes longer to come to temperature and to reduce.
There is no par sheet and the chef is off. How do you decide how much to prep?
Why ask it
Good answers start with information: the bookings, what sold yesterday, what is left in the walk-in. Guessing high wastes product and guessing low sinks the service, so you want someone who looks before they cut.
An hour before service you can see your list will not be finished. What do you do?
Why ask it
Speaking up early gives the chef time to move a pair of hands. The cook also has to choose well, finishing what cannot be made to order and leaving what can be cut during a lull.
When you think your way is better than the recipe card, what do you do?
Why ask it
Line cooking is making the chef's dish the same way every time, so the answer you hope for is to cook it as written and raise the idea after service. Quiet improvements are how a dish drifts until two guests at one table get different plates.
How often do you taste during prep, and what do you do when a batch is off?
Why ask it
Tasting should be constant, with a clean spoon each time. The second half matters more: a cook who flags a salty sauce at three o'clock saves it, and one who hopes nobody notices sends it out all night.
How do you keep waste down on your station without cutting portions?
Why ask it
Waste control on the line is trim use, rotation and accurate par levels. If their first instinct is to shave portions, the saving is coming off the guest's plate.
Service
Six tickets land on your rail at once. What do you do in the first thirty seconds?
Why ask it
The cooks who stay out of the weeds read every ticket before they touch a pan. Hope to hear an all-day count, such as five burgers across the six tickets, and the longest cook going down first.
Your steak takes twelve minutes and the fish on the next station takes four. How does that table go out together?
Why ask it
Timing a table is a conversation between stations, not a private calculation. The steak fires first, the times get called across the line and the fish waits for the word, and a cook who works it out alone sends half the table cold.
What do you call out during service, and what do you expect to hear back?
Why ask it
Kitchens differ in their words, but the habit travels: a call is answered, a count is repeated, and 'behind' and 'hot' are said every single time. Silence on a line is how people get burned and tickets get missed.
A steak comes back because the guest says it is overcooked. What happens next on your station?
Why ask it
The refire goes to the front and gets called, and the argument about whether it really was medium waits until later or never happens. Watch for irritation at the guest or the server, because that mood travels down a line fast.
Tell me about a service that fell apart. What did you do?
Why ask it
Every cook has had one. Listen for what they did, such as calling expo, dropping a course or asking for help, rather than an account of whose fault it was.
How do you handle it when a chef or expo corrects you mid service?
Why ask it
Correction during service is constant and impersonal, and cooks who take it as an insult make the whole line slower. The answer to hope for is short: say 'heard', fix the plate, and raise it after service if it still seems unfair.
What do you do when you run out of a component halfway through service?
Why ask it
A shortage mid service is a communication test. Good answers involve telling expo and the front of house immediately; worrying ones involve quietly substituting something and saying nothing.
How do you keep your station clean while the rail is full?
Why ask it
Wiping down between tickets, a folded towel, a sanitiser bucket that gets changed and a reset after every push are the marks of someone trained well. A cook who says cleaning waits until the rush is over will be working in a mess by eight o'clock.
The cook next to you is buried and you are caught up. What do you do?
Why ask it
The useful move is to ask what they need, or to take the tickets they hand over, and not to reach into their station uninvited. It also shows whether they watch the whole line or only their own board.
What do you do with a slow hour between lunch and dinner?
Why ask it
Restocking, backup prep, cleaning the low shelves and checking dates are what a self-starter describes. An honest 'that is when I take my break' is fine too, as long as the station is set before they sit down.
What is the busiest shift you have worked a cook short, and how did the line cover the gap?
Why ask it
The mechanics are what count: who slid over to cover two stations, what came off the menu, who called the tickets. Note how they talk about the person who did not come in.
What does your station look like when you leave it after a closing shift?
Why ask it
The details to hope for are product wrapped, labelled and moved into smaller containers, the reach-in wiped out, and a prep list left for the opener. Whoever opens the next morning is the one who finds out how this cook closes.
Food safety
What temperature do you cook chicken to, and how do you check it?
Why ask it
Two things are on test: the number your local food code sets, and whether they reach for a probe thermometer instead of judging by colour or cutting it open. Look up the figure for your area beforehand so you know a right answer when you hear it.
Walk me through what you do with a hot pan of rice at the end of the night.
Why ask it
Cooling procedure separates cooks trained properly from cooks who picked it up loosely. Shallow pans, an ice bath or blast chiller, left uncovered until cool, labelled and dated are all good signs.
Someone tells you a guest has a shellfish allergy. What changes on your station?
Why ask it
You are listening for cross contact, not just the ingredient: clean pan, fresh utensils, changed gloves, telling the rest of the line. Cooks who only mention leaving the shrimp out have a gap worth training.
How do you label and date product, and who checked it in your last kitchen?
Why ask it
Labelling habits show whether their last kitchen ran on discipline or on memory. If nobody checked, expect to build the habit from scratch rather than inherit it.
Where do raw chicken, raw beef and ready-to-eat food go when they share a walk-in?
Why ask it
The usual teaching is ready-to-eat food on top, raw meat below it and poultry lowest, so nothing drips onto food that will not be cooked again. A wrong answer is quick to teach, but it tells you how the last kitchen was run.
When during a shift do you wash your hands or change gloves?
Why ask it
You should hear specific moments: after raw protein, after the bin, after touching a phone or a face, on coming back to the line. Be wary of anyone who treats gloves as a replacement for washing, since a dirty glove spreads as much as a dirty hand.
You wake up with a stomach bug on a day you are scheduled. What do you do?
Why ask it
Many cooks have been taught by short-staffed kitchens to come in anyway. Tell them your rule in the same breath, because when a sick food worker has to stay away is set by local health rules, and they need to know you will find the cover.
You open in the morning and the reach-in is reading warm. What do you do?
Why ask it
Telling the chef, probing the product itself and writing down what was found is the sequence to hope for. What gets thrown out is a decision for whoever is in charge under your local rules, and the cook's job is to make sure that person knows.
Have you been through a health inspection, and what did the inspector look at on your station?
Why ask it
A cook who has stood through one remembers it: thermometers, date labels, sanitiser strength, the handwash sink. Someone who has only heard about inspections afterwards has probably worked where the chef handled all of it.
Do you hold a food handler card or a food safety certificate, and is it current?
Why ask it
Which certificate a cook needs, and how soon after hiring, depends on your state or country, so find out what applies to you before the interview. Ask to see it, and say whether you pay for a renewal.
Have you been cut or burned at work, and what did you do in the next five minutes?
Why ask it
Everyone on a line has, and the answer shows whether they stop, cover it properly and tell someone. Working on with an open cut is a food safety problem as well as a personal one, so explain where your first aid kit is and who gets told.
Team
How do you learn a new dish best: written down, tasted, or shown once?
Why ask it
Their answer plans the first week for you. Someone who wants it written down needs your recipe cards up to date, and someone who learns by watching needs ten minutes beside whoever plates the dish best.
What habit from an earlier kitchen did you have to unlearn?
Why ask it
Every kitchen teaches a shortcut or two that the next one will not accept, such as sauces left unlabelled or tasting with a finger. Naming theirs, and who set them straight, shows they have been coached before and took it.
Have you trained anyone? How did you teach them your station?
Why ask it
Being able to teach a station is a large part of whether this hire could one day run the line as lead cook. Ask what they did when the trainee kept making the same mistake, which is where most people stop teaching.
What does a chef do that gets your best work, and what makes you go quiet?
Why ask it
This tells you how to manage them, which is worth more than most answers about skill. If what shuts them down is the way your kitchen sounds on a Saturday, it is better that both of you know today.
Tell me about a cook you did not get along with. How did the two of you get through service?
Why ask it
Friction on a line is normal, and what counts is whether the food still went out. Hope for a plain account of working around each other, and take note if the story ends with someone walking off the line.
How do you talk to the dishwasher when the pit is backed up and you need pans?
Why ask it
The way a cook speaks about the dish pit is a fair read of how they treat anyone with less standing than them. The ones worth hiring ask for what they need, say thanks, and have scrubbed a pan themselves when it came to it.
A server comes to the pass upset about a late table. What do you say?
Why ask it
A time and a straight answer, such as 'two minutes on table twelve', is all the moment needs. Cooks who snap at the floor start a standoff that the guests end up paying for.
What would your last chef say about you, good and bad?
Why ask it
Most people answer the second half honestly, and the flaw they name is usually the one you will end up managing. Claiming their chef would have nothing critical to say is not a straight answer.
Hours and pay
What is your availability, and how do you feel about doubles and weekend closes?
Why ask it
Better to hear a hard limit now than in week three. Say which shifts the opening really covers before they answer, so nobody agrees to weekends they cannot work just to get through the interview.
How do you get to work, and what would a 6 a.m. start mean for you?
Why ask it
Ask about the journey and not about whether they own a car. A first bus that arrives after the prep shift starts, or a last train that leaves before the close, is something you can often schedule around once you know.
When you are going to be late for a shift, what do you do?
Why ask it
Buses fail and children get sick, so the lateness matters less than the call. A message an hour ahead lets the chef move the prep list around, and a gap discovered at four o'clock does not.
Do you have another job, and how would the two schedules fit together?
Why ask it
Plenty of cooks work two kitchens, and it need not be a problem. You are asking which job gives way when both want Saturday, and whether they will arrive at your close straight from someone else's open.
The job is a full shift on your feet in the heat, lifting cases and full stock pots. Can you do that, with or without adjustments?
Why ask it
Describe the physical work and ask whether they can do it, and leave health, age and old injuries out of the question. What an employer may ask here differs by country and state, so read up on your local rules before the interview.
What hourly rate are you looking for?
Why ask it
Give your range first if you can, since it saves both sides a wasted trial shift. Ask what they want and not what they earned before: questions about past pay are restricted in some places, and the old figure matters less than whether yours works for them.
Can you come in for a paid trial shift, and which service suits you?
Why ask it
A cook with a current job may only be free one day a week, so be flexible about when and firm about paying for the hours. Whether and how a trial shift can be run depends on your country or state, so confirm that before you offer one.
Which chef or sous chef from your last two kitchens can I call?
Why ask it
Asking for a name and a number while they sit across from you tells you something by itself. If they still work there, agree when you will call, and ask the reference two things: did they turn up, and would you have them back on the line.
If I offered you the job, when could you start?
Why ask it
Wanting to give their current kitchen proper notice shows you how they will leave yours one day. Someone ready to walk out tomorrow may have good reason, so ask what it is.
What do you want to know about this kitchen before you decide?
Why ask it
What comes back shows how far they have pictured the job: who is on the line, how the schedule is posted, whether there is a staff meal. Nothing at all to ask can mean they have not imagined working here yet, or do not expect to stay long.
Interviewing Line Cooks
Practical guidance for the conversation itself
Choosing from the list
Take two or three from each group
Nobody asks all of these in one sitting. A sit-down with a cook between their shifts is short, so pick the ones that match your kitchen, ask every candidate the same handful in the same words, and write the answers down so Thursday's cook can be compared with Monday's.
Hiring a line cook
Spend longest in the Service group: timing a table with the next station, calling out, refires and what happens when the rail fills. Name your busiest station and your real cover count, and ask the questions about that.
Hiring a prep cook
Lean on Prep and Food safety and skip the ticket questions. Scaling a recipe, working without a par sheet, labelling, cooling and storage order are most of the job, and a prep cook who wants the line later will tell you so when you ask about two years from now.
Breakfast, short-order and institutional kitchens
A breakfast or diner cook should be asked about speed on the flat top and holding ten orders in their head. For a school, hospital or care home kitchen, give the allergy and food safety questions the most time and add one about cooking to a set menu and special diets.
Keep the food safety questions whatever else goes
Cooking temperatures, cooling, allergens and coming to work sick are where a wrong hire can hurt a guest. If time runs short, cut from Background first: the day off and the two years from now can wait for the trial shift.
Stay on the job
Experience, availability and how someone works are fair ground. Questions about age, health, family plans, religion or where someone is from are restricted in many places, so find out what your local employment rules allow before you sit down.
Run a trial shift, not just an interview
A conversation tells you how somebody talks about cooking. A paid two to four hour trial on the station you are hiring for tells you whether they can hold it. Put them on prep for an hour, then let them work part of a service alongside your strongest cook. What a trial may involve and how it has to be paid depends on your country or state, so confirm that before you invite anyone in.
What to watch during the trial
- Do they set up their own mise without being told what comes next?
- Do they clean as they go, or leave a station somebody else has to reset?
- Do they taste, and do they adjust seasoning without asking permission first?
- Do they speak up when they are behind, or go quiet and hope it resolves?
- How do they take a correction from your chef in front of other people?
- Do they wash their hands and change gloves without being reminded?
Practical items to settle before a trial
- Hours and pay sits last in the list, but when the opening is weekend closes or doubles, raise availability in the first five minutes. A cook who cannot work the shifts you are filling should hear that before a trial, not after one.
- Confirm transport and how they would reach an early start or leave after a late close.
- State the pay, the schedule pattern and the trial arrangement plainly, in writing wherever you can.
- Ask about any food handler certification your jurisdiction requires, then check it rather than assume it.
Common mistakes
- Interviewing only about creativity. Most line work is repetition and consistency, and a candidate who only wants to develop dishes will be restless on a station that plates the same twelve all week.
- Skipping food safety questions because they feel too basic. Cooling, holding temperatures and allergen handling are where the real risk sits.
- Talking for most of the interview. If you spend twenty minutes describing the job, you learn nothing about the person in front of you.
- Hiring on resume names alone. A well known kitchen tells you where someone stood, not what they were trusted to do there.
- Not calling the last chef. Two minutes on reliability and cleanliness is worth more than another round of interviews.
Questions a cook should ask back
If you are the cook
These are the questions to ask in a cooking interview before you agree to a trial shift. The answers say more about a kitchen than its menu does.
- How many cooks are on the line during a busy service, and how many are on prep?
- Which station would I start on, and who works next to me?
- How is the schedule posted, and how far ahead?
- Is there a staff meal, and how are breaks actually handled?
- How does overtime work, and who decides when it happens?
- Do cooks share in tips or a service charge here?
- Is the trial shift paid, and how long does it run?
- Why did the last cook on this station leave?
If you are the one hiring
Have a straight answer ready for each of those. Evasiveness about hours and pay is the fastest way to lose a good cook to the restaurant down the street.