Run a More Profitable, Organized Kitchen

Today’s Chef needs more than raw culinary creativity and talent…we need to wear multiple hats: culinary visionary, HR specialist, budget hound, food cost pro, labor cost cutter, social media innovator, etc. Get practical Excel tools, kitchen-management training and staff-development resources. Stop guessing your food cost or how to handle the P&L meeting. Use our tools to run your kitchen as a creative, talented Chef who also knows and understands the numbers. We have content for all the hats that today’s Chefs are expected to wear.

Control food cost. Improve inventory accuracy. Standardize recipes. Train your crew. Walk into the next P&L meeting prepared.

“Built by a Working Chef Who Runs Kitchens…Chef David Buchanan – 40+ years in professional kitchens.
Created by a Chef for Chefs. I deliver tools that work during service, and in the budget meeting, not just in theory.”

Practical Management Tools for Professional Chefs… No BS

Unlike standard recipe blogs, Chefs Resources is a comprehensive digital encyclopedia and management hub built to solve your daily kitchen headaches. Whether you need to fix an out-of-control food cost, prepare for a rigorous P&L meeting, impress the health inspector, or simply hold your crew accountable, we have the practical resources you need.

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What You Get When You Join:

Control Food Cost
Calculate plate costs, identify inventory errors, analyze sales mix and locate the operational leaks driving up your food-cost percentage.

Organize Kitchen Operations
Use editable schedules, prep sheets, order guides, cleaning lists and station task sheets instead of building every form from scratch.

Train and Develop Your Crew
Give cooks, sous chefs and supervisors structured lessons covering mise en place, kitchen communication, inventory, scheduling and professional kitchen standards.

Prepare for the Numbers
Understand theoretical versus actual food cost, menu engineering and P&L results so you can explain performance and propose solutions.

Choose the subscription level that fits your kitchen’s needs and start making your work life easier today.

Simply Your Workload…Improve Your Productivity

Choose your subscription level below
Cancel any time

Level Price Action

$25 Professional: Complete Access Subscription

$25.00 per Month. Customers in Washington will be charged 8.5% tax.

Start Membership

$8.75 Platinum: Tools + Mgmt Training Subscription

$8.75 per Month. Customers in Washington will be charged 8.5% tax.

Start Membership

$5.50 Premium: Kitchen Tools Subscription

$5.50 per Month. Customers in Washington will be charged 8.5% tax.

Start Membership

Join 7,100+ Professional Chefs Using Our Tools to Improve Their Skill-Set and Make Their Work Life Easier

Not ready for a paid membership? Create a free account for site updates and limited downloads. Available on the Subscription page.

One Spreadsheet can Pay for the Subscription

Illustrative example; actual results depend on the operation.

Example:
If your kitchen does:

  • $40,000 food sales per week
  • and you reduce food cost 1%
  • You save:
  • $20,800 per year

All from fixing food cost leaks.

Below are examples of some of the management resources available to paid subscribers.

 

These are some of the Downloads are available to all Paid Subscribers

Chefs Resources Kitchen Management Basics Collection

20 Essential Kitchen Spreadsheets all in One File!
The file includes: Bulk Recipe Template, Scalable Recipe Template, Food Safety Forms, Inventory Foodcost Calculation, Sales Mix Calculator, Sync Recipes & Inventory, Event Planning, and some others.

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Shorthand Recipe Template

Shorthand Recipe Template

Quick and to the Point
Simplified recipe template for experienced cooks.
Every gap represents a step. No lengthy, wordy recipes!
Perfect for the Chef who has experienced staff.

Classic Recipe Template

Classic Recipe Template

Standard Long-form Format
The traditional recipe template.
Perfect for Chefs who have less experienced cooks that need to have “everything spelled out”.

Beef Butchering Yield Form

Beef Butchering Yield Form

Mentor Your Staff to Reach High Standards
Do you know the butchering yields on your Top Sirloins, Filet Mignons, Strip Loins and other steaks? Are all of your cooks held accountable to strict butchering variances? This form helps standardize your expected yield and holds staff accountable to that standard.

Sales Mix Calculator

Sales Mix Form

Fixing High Food Costs:
The single most important form to use if you consistently have a high (or low) food cost. If your company does not have its own version, then you need this. It calculates your Theoretical Food Cost, based solely upon menu items sold. Sometimes a “high food cost” is actually a good thing.

Kitchen Schedule

Kitchen Cooks Schedule

Build Labor Schedules that hit your Labor Budget
Includes total hours per week per crew member, station assignments, staffing coverage. Use different colors to assign the crew to different stations

Labor Cost Excel Template

Labor Cost Form

Forecast & Manage your Labor

1 Column Prep Sheet

Prep Sheets 1 Column

Keep your crew on track for service.
 Choose from several Prep List formats.

Project/Event Planning

Excel Event Planning for Chefs
Excel Event Planning for Chefs #2

Manage Special Events, Banquets, New Concepts with Detailed Planning
Multiple tabs for project/event planning includes: Ideas/Brainstorming, Menu, multiple Recipe tabs, Equipment List, Prep Planning over multiple days, ordering timeline, and more.

Sync Recipes & Inventory

Sync Inventory and Recipes

Keep Your Recipe Costs Up to Date
If your company does not have software that updates your recipe costs based upon current prices, then this form is for you.

Kitchen Station Task List

Kitchen Station Task List

Manage the Productivity Gaps
Assign specific tasks to each station for Before Service, During Service, and Closing. This makes it easy to hold everyone accountable to specific tasks. If something is habitually missed…add it to the expectations list!

 

For Platinum Subscribers – Video Tutorial Library

These are just a few examples from the video library

40 Thieves of Food Cost

53 minutes

Forty Thieves of Food Cost

Food Cost % Myth

9.37 minutes

Food Cost Myth video

Theoretical Food Cost -vs-
Actual Food Cost

12.40 minutes

Restaurant Inventory Control
– Part 1 of 3

17.20 minutes

Using Excel for Recipe Costing & Inventory Linking

16.28 minutes

Sales Mix Form Overview
and Utilization

18.16 minutes

 

Professional Subscription Benefits – Part 1
Kitchen Management Course – Examples of some of the lessons

Kitchen Management Training For Sous Chefs, Kitchen Managers & Chefs
Some of these videos are the same as above but structured as classes with Notes, PDFs, and all the downloadable Excel forms  organized by class topic

Menu Engineering – Increase your Profits

9.45 minutes

Menu Engineering Kitchen Management Course
Video: Menu Engineering Basics and how to use menu layout to increase your profits.
Video index timestamps.
Downloadable Menu Engineering PowerPoint PDF.
Downloadable notes for this section.

Analyze Sales Mix to Increase Profits

32.30 minutes

Sales Mix Kitchen Management Course
Video: In-depth demo of Sales Mix Analysis and how it can increase your restaurant revenue.
Video index timestamps.
Downloadable Sales Mix Analysis PowerPoint PDF.
Downloadable notes for this section.

Restaurant Inventory Control
– Part 3
Find/Fix Inventory Errors

13.28 minutes

Inventory part 3 - How to Edit Excel Inventory Sheets
Video: Step-by-step demo of how to use Excel to Fix Inventory Errors.
Video index timestamps.
Downloadable Food cost Calculation Form

Art of Plate Presentation

25.15 minutes

The Art of Plate Presentation Course
Video: Geometric shapes create the backbone for designing artistic plate presentations. Lots of photos showing different plating techniques.
Video index timestamps.
Downloadable Plate Presentation PowerPoint PDF.
Downloadable notes for this section.
Links to additional food porn inspiration.

Forty Thieves of Food Cost

53.12 minutes

Food Cost Myth training video

Video: In-depth review of Food Cost Management
Video index timestamps.
Downloadable 40 Thieves of Food Cost PDF.
Downloadable notes for this section.
40 Thieves PowerPoint download.
8 Downloadable food cost related forms.

Prepare for P&L Meetings

40.36 minutes

How to Handle P&L Meetings video tutorial
Video: How to Successfully Manage P&L Meetings
Video index timestamps.
Downloadable notes for this section.
P&L Meetings for Success PowerPoint download.

Professional Subscription Benefits – Continued
Kitchen Staff Training Videos

Use these videos to train your Line Cooks basic kitchen principles and philosophies

Mise en Place –
What is mise en place?

9.30 minutes

Mise en Place video lesson

n depth discussion about the principles of mise en place and what it means. Mise en place is more than just your prep. It is also your utensils, your plates, your equipment, knowing potential challenges for the shift, and being mentally ready for the day.

The Kitchen Code
Part 1 of 2

8.58 minutes

The Kitchen Code - Part 1

Part 1 presents 16 of 32 common rules of the professional kitchen. These rules may be unspoken, but long-time cooks know and understand them to be true.

Improve Cook-Server Communication

11.18 minutes

Improve Cook-Server Communication video lesson

Improving the communication between cooks & servers improves efficiency, decreases mistakes, stress & frustration, and increases speed of service. Good communication improves life in the kitchen. Poor communication creates a sh__ty work experience.

 

Simply Your Workload…Improve Your Productivity

Choose your subscription level below

Level Price Action

$25 Professional: Complete Access Subscription

$25.00 per Month. Customers in Washington will be charged 8.5% tax.

Start Membership

$8.75 Platinum: Tools + Mgmt Training Subscription

$8.75 per Month. Customers in Washington will be charged 8.5% tax.

Start Membership

$5.50 Premium: Kitchen Tools Subscription

$5.50 per Month. Customers in Washington will be charged 8.5% tax.

Start Membership

Want additional info/details?
Follow this link for a deeper dive into the practical opportunities in each subscription level.

 

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