Free Prep Cook Job Description Templates

In a restaurant kitchen, the prep cook is the person who makes service possible, the one who washes, cuts, portions, and preps everything before the line ever fires a dish. Hiring a good one matters, and the job description is where you make the role clear. Prep cook is a broad title, though: a general prep cook, a busy-restaurant prep cook, a catering prep cook, an entry-level part-timer, and a lead prep cook do different work at different paces. A specific posting filters for the person who fits both the type and the reality of your kitchen.

At FirstHR, food service is a vertical we know well, and we build for the independent restaurants and small operators that hire without an HR department, where the owner or kitchen manager writes the posting between shifts. The five templates below cover the most common versions of the role: general, restaurant, catering, part-time, and lead. Each is ready to use. Fill in the bracketed fields, adjust to match your kitchen, and post. For the general principles behind any posting, the guide to writing a job description covers the fundamentals.

What Is a Prep Cook Job Description?

A prep cook job description is a document that explains the role's purpose, responsibilities, skills, and pay so you can post a job and attract the right candidates. It typically covers a job summary, responsibilities, required skills, the shift and pay, and how to apply. The SHRM job description tools describe a job description as a plain-language tool that explains the tasks, duties, and responsibilities of a position, and that standard applies whether you run a large kitchen or a single independent restaurant.

Because the title spans entry-level part-timers to lead prep cooks across restaurants and catering, the most important job of the description is to make the type, shift, and pace unmistakable, and to be clear that it is a prep role rather than a line role. If you actually need someone cooking and plating during service, that is a line cook, a distinct role covered in the comparison below.

Which Template Should You Use?

Pick the template that matches the type of prep cook you need. The core structure is the same across all five, but each one emphasizes the responsibilities, pace, and language that fit a specific kind of kitchen or role. Use this guide to choose.

5 Free Prep Cook Job Description Templates

Download all five as a single Word document or copy individual templates. Each one follows the same structure: restaurant overview, job summary, responsibilities, skills, compensation, and how to apply. Fill in the brackets before you post.

Template 1: Prep Cook (General)

The universal baseline. Washing, cutting, portioning, and prepping ingredients and components for any kitchen. Use this if your role does not fit cleanly into a specific type.

Template 2: Restaurant Prep Cook

Tuned for a busy restaurant: building mise en place, prepping to spec, and stepping onto the line during peak service.

Template 3: Catering / Banquet Prep Cook

For event and banquet prep: high-volume batch work from event counts, plus packing and staging food for transport.

Template 4: Part-Time / Entry-Level Prep Cook

No experience required, with on-the-job training. For a reliable first kitchen hire learning the basics of food prep.

Template 5: Lead / Senior Prep Cook

Sets prep lists, prepares complex components, and trains the prep team. For an experienced prep cook stepping into leadership.

Prep Cook Duties and Responsibilities

A prep cook readies the kitchen for service and keeps it food-safe. The duties fall into four broad categories. A good job description picks the specific duties from each category that apply to your kitchen rather than listing every possible task.

The mix shifts by type: a catering prep cook weighs heavily toward high-volume batch prep, while a restaurant prep cook focuses on mise en place and supporting the line. At a small restaurant, the prep cook often covers several of these at once and pitches in across the kitchen. For help scoping the role precisely before you write the posting, the guide to defining job responsibilities walks through a simple process.

Prep Cook vs Line Cook

Prep cook and line cook are the two most-confused kitchen roles, and hiring the wrong one slows your kitchen. The key difference is timing and task: a prep cook prepares before and during service, while a line cook cooks and plates to order during service.

A prep cook does the upfront work so the line can move fast, and prep is often where a cook starts before moving to the line. Name the role you are filling, since the experience and pace differ. If you need someone cooking on the line during service, the line cook templates are the right fit. As your kitchen grows, you may also need a restaurant manager to run the front and back of house.

Skills and Requirements

Most prep cook roles value reliability, speed, basic knife skills, and a commitment to food safety, and most need only on-the-job training. Beyond that, the specific requirements shift by type, and the strongest postings use concrete language and reasonable requirements.

Specific, measurable duties attract candidates who can actually do the work and signal a serious employer. Keep the language neutral and inclusive too, since the EEOC prohibits job advertisements that show a preference based on protected characteristics. For recognized tasks and skills you can borrow, the O*NET profile for food preparation workers lists standard responsibilities and work activities.

Prep Cook Pay

Set your hourly rate using government data as a baseline, adjusted for experience, region, and how busy your kitchen is. Pay rises from entry-level and part-time to experienced and lead roles.

Position your rate against the type and experience: entry and part-time prep cooks sit toward the lower end, while experienced and lead prep cooks earn more, and busy or higher-end kitchens pay above the median. Always state an hourly rate. It is now legally required in many states and it attracts more applicants in a fast-moving market. Federal wage and hour rules also apply, so review the basics in the Department of Labor FLSA standards before you set pay.

Hiring a Prep Cook for a Small Restaurant

Large chains have HR teams, recruiters, and standardized hiring. An independent restaurant has none of that. The owner or kitchen manager writes the posting, interviews, and onboards the new cook personally, including the food-safety basics. As your team grows, the same is true of other roles, which is why hiring a bartender follows a similar hands-on pattern. The SBA guide to hiring and managing employees covers the basics for a small business. Here is how to write the prep cook posting for that reality.

From Hiring to Onboarding

The job description is step one. Once a candidate accepts, the same document becomes the foundation for the offer and the onboarding plan. A prep cook needs a fast, clear start because kitchens are busy and food safety matters from the first shift.

Collect new-hire paperwork including the I-9 and W-4, confirm or arrange the food handler card, and walk the new cook through food-safety basics, your recipes, and station setup in the first shifts. Once you have your offer ready, an onboarding template gives your new prep cook a structured start, and the restaurant employee handbook template sets out your kitchen policies and standards. FirstHR connects the offer, e-signature on new-hire forms, paperwork, and onboarding workflow in one place, so an independent restaurant can onboard a new prep cook quickly without a dedicated HR department.

Keeping signed documents and food-safety records on file matters in a restaurant, so the guide to HR document management explains how to organize personnel files even without an HR team. For a restaurant-specific onboarding flow, the restaurant employee onboarding checklist walks through the first days for cooks and other kitchen staff.

Frequently Asked Questions