Café Chef jobs

TRADE is looking for a restless, highly creative and hands-on Head Chef to shape the next phase of our independent London café group.

We want a chef brimming with ideas: someone who constantly tastes, questions, develops and improves; who follows contemporary food and bakery culture; and who wants the freedom to create food that makes people take notice.

You will also inherit real operational responsibility. You will lead our production kitchen, drive and develop its team, own food safety and standards, and ensure that your ideas can be executed consistently across multiple cafés.

Put simply, we want a creative force who knows how to run the machine—not merely a machine operator who can occasionally be creative.

About TRADE

TRADE was founded in 2014 and has grown into a group of four London cafés supported by our own production kitchen.

Our food brings together the energy of Melbourne café culture, the generosity of New York delis and an increasingly broad range of contemporary influences. We make much of our food from scratch, including our pastrami, smoked turkey, sauces, cakes, cookies and bakery products.

Our ambition has always been to create the world’s best local café: somewhere familiar and generous, but constantly moving forward.

We are now entering an exciting new phase. We want to retain the breakfast, brunch and trademark sandwiches for which we are known while adding a focused, regularly changing selection of fresh seasonal plates. We also want to elevate our existing dishes, transform our bakery and dessert offer, and give people more reasons to visit TRADE throughout the day.

We are not trying to create fine dining. We want bold, fresh and brilliantly executed food with generosity, personality and panache.

The role

This is a working Head Chef position based principally inside our production kitchen—not a desk-based Executive Chef role.

You will lead a small, capable production team and work alongside them to set the pace, improve output and maintain standards. Your job will also be to develop their skills and independence, creating enough capacity for you to work on new food and spend meaningful time inside our cafés.

You will work directly with TRADE’s founders and have significant influence over the future of our food.

We have a strong brand, an established customer base, plenty of ideas and very little interest in standing still.

Excellent operations are the foundation of this role—not its ultimate ambition.

What you will doDrive TRADE’s food forward

• Work with the founders to define and deliver the next stage of TRADE’s food.
• Create a focused range of distinctive seasonal plates that gives customers new reasons to visit us for lunch.
• Protect the character of our successful breakfast, brunch and trademark sandwich offer while continuing to move it forward.
• Review every existing dish and identify how its flavour, ingredients, texture, presentation, consistency or commercial performance could be improved.
• Develop exciting new cakes, cookies, desserts and bakery products.
• Follow contemporary restaurant, café and bakery culture and bring relevant new techniques, ingredients and ideas into TRADE.
• Maintain an active development calendar, moving ideas quickly from initial test to finished launch.
• Be willing to try things, learn from sales and customer response, improve them—and remove them when they do not work.

Turn ideas into executable products

• Take dishes from initial concept through testing, costing, recipe development, specification, training and launch.
• Ensure that new food remains practical to produce, transport, hold and serve across multiple locations.
• Create clear recipes, photographs, batch sheets, plating instructions and training materials.
• Test products under real service conditions rather than only in a development kitchen.
• Train teams personally and remain involved until the food is being executed properly.
• Balance creativity with selling price, GP, labour, shelf life, waste and service speed.

Lead the production kitchen

• Take direct responsibility for the organisation, output and day-to-day leadership of our production kitchen.
• Work alongside the team, setting the pace and demonstrating the standards expected.
• Plan production intelligently across the group and ensure that café orders are completed accurately and on time.
• Establish clear responsibilities, production targets and quality-control points.
• Improve workflow, kitchen layout, batch scheduling and use of equipment.
• Increase the capability, pace and accountability of the existing team.
• Build a production kitchen that can operate confidently when you are spending time on development or inside the cafés.
• Recruit, train, coach and performance-manage kitchen employees as required.

Own food standards across the group

• Take overall responsibility for food quality and consistency across every TRADE location.
• Visit cafés regularly to taste food, inspect kitchens, coach employees and identify opportunities for improvement.
• Work alongside site teams during service when necessary.
• Ensure that recipes, portions, presentation, holding procedures and service standards are followed.
• Introduce practical food audits and follow corrective actions through to completion.
• Support the recruitment and training of chefs and other employees handling food across the business.
• Create a culture in which people understand why standards matter rather than simply completing paperwork.

Food Safety

• Own food-safety management across our production kitchen and cafés.
• Maintain robust HACCP, allergen, traceability, labelling, cleaning, temperature-control and due-diligence systems.
• Ensure that food-safety documentation accurately reflects what happens operationally and is understood by the people using it.
• Lead the business through EHO visits and maintain the highest possible food-hygiene standards.
• Identify risks before they become problems and ensure that corrective actions are completed promptly.
• Maintain accurate recipes, allergen records, production specifications and shelf-life controls.

You should be the person who notices an issue before an EHO does—and who has the knowledge, systems and evidence to demonstrate that the business is properly controlled.

Who we are looking for

You may already be a hands-on Head Chef or Production Head Chef, or you may be an exceptional Senior Sous Chef ready to take complete ownership of a food operation.

Previous group-level experience is not essential. We care more about the quality and relevance of what you have done, the responsibility you have genuinely carried and what you are capable of doing next.

You will need:

• A strong track record in a vibrant, modern café, bakery, all-day restaurant or similarly ambitious food business.
• Excellent all-round cooking ability and a highly developed palate.
• A current understanding of interesting, contemporary food.
• Strong professional baking and pastry experience. Practical knowledge of cakes, cookies and desserts is essential.
• Proven experience leading a busy kitchen or food-production team.
• The ability to drive pace, productivity and accountability without sacrificing quality.
• Experience developing new dishes and successfully introducing them into live service or production.
• Strong knowledge of food safety, HACCP and allergen management.
• The confidence and technical competence to take complete ownership of EHO standards.
• Good production-planning, organisational and costing skills.
• A visible, energetic leadership style and a willingness to work alongside the team.
• The confidence to challenge existing practices and the humility to collaborate.
• Evidence of commitment and sustained ownership, ideally including at least one substantial recent tenure of approximately three years or more.

Experience working in Australia, or within a genuinely Australian-influenced café or restaurant, would be particularly welcome. Experience with viennoiserie, central production or multi-site food operations would also be advantageous.

Most importantly, you must still love making food. You should find it difficult to walk past something mediocre without wanting to improve it. You should enjoy tasting, demonstrating, teaching, problem-solving and being physically present wherever the food is being made or served.

What we offer

• £40,000 basic salary.
• Participation in our tronc scheme, currently expected to add approximately £10,000 per year based on the anticipated working pattern. Tronc is variable and not guaranteed.
• Predominantly daytime working.
• Genuine creative influence over an established and evolving London food business.
• Direct access to the founders and the ability to turn good ideas into reality without layers of corporate approval.
• A capable existing production team with the opportunity to develop people and shape the structure around you.
• The chance to transform TRADE’s menus, bakery offer and wider culinary identity.
• An environment that values momentum, experimentation and personality alongside rigorous food standards.

Applying

Please submit your CV together with a short covering note answering two questions:

• What is the best dish, product or menu range you have personally created, and what made it successful?
• What kitchen, team or production operation have you personally made work better, and how did you do it?

The selection process will explore both sides of the role. We are interested in what you can create, but also in how you organise a kitchen, develop people, maintain standards and turn an idea into food that can be delivered consistently across several cafés.

TRADE welcomes applications from people of all backgrounds. Appointment will be based on relevant experience, ability, potential and alignment with the food and working culture we are building.

Pay: £40,000.00-£50,000.00 per year

Benefits:

• Discounted or free food
• Employee discount

Ability to commute/relocate:

• Islington N1 3PB: reliably commute or plan to relocate before starting work (required)

Education:

• GCSE or equivalent (preferred)

Experience:

• Kitchen management: 3 years (preferred)
• Menu Development: 2 years (preferred)

Work authorisation:

• United Kingdom (required)

Work Location: In person