Executive Chef - Development, Chinese Cuisine Specialty

About us

Since 1942, SkyChefs has taken culinary excellence to new heights. As a trusted partner to the nation’s leading airlines and retailers, we proudly deliver millions of meals and exceptional service experiences every year across 43 sites throughout the United States. Built on a legacy of operational excellence, culinary expertise, and continuous innovation, we are committed to setting the industry standard in aviation culinary, airline services, last-mile logistics, and retail commerce. From the kitchen to the runway, our teams work together to deliver quality, reliability, and service at every altitude. Our people are the heart of everything we do. At SkyChefs, a career is more than a job – it’s an opportunity to grow, lead, and make an impact in a fast-paced, team-driven environment. Join America’s first, foremost, and finest and take your career to new heights.

Role Purpose Statement

Bring authentic Chinese flavors to the skies! The Executive Chef – Design & Development, Chinese Cuisine leads the creation of innovative, high-quality, and cost-effective Chinese menus for global airline partners. This role blends culinary artistry with technical precision—developing detailed recipes, yield specifications, and production processes tailored for large-scale fresh food manufacturing.

You will serve as the culinary expert for Chinese cuisine, ensuring authenticity, consistency, and compliance with strict airline, HACCP, and FDA standards. Through collaboration with internal teams and airline clients, you will design exceptional in-flight dining experiences that meet rigorous specifications and delight passengers worldwide.

Main Accountabilities

Menu Development

• Design, implement and lead menu presentations for Chinese and other assigned airline customers
• Execute the culinary process steps of the standard design process within the Program Management Team and adhere to deadlines and cost targets
• Plan, prepare, and execute customer menu presentations
• Document specification changes, validate yielding and methods and batch recipe conversion estimates during menu presentation cooking and preparation.
• Consistently research new products entering the marketplace which could be added to the standard products from the established catalog of menu/recipe components and ingredient items
• Execute training to Executive Chefs and culinary personnel at Customer Service Centers (CSC) on menu cycle changes
• Responsible for auditing and critiquing customer menus in a CSC via photo or in-house reviews, and ensuring all necessary improvements are made
• Perform yield studies on various products to get a true yielded cost in CBASE
• Design and implement start-up of new customer menus
• Design recipes and specifications to ensure that Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Points (HACCP) and Food and Drug Administration (FDA) standards are maintained
• Interface and act as company culinary representative with customers
• Design food production and packing around Lean Manufacturing and Quality initiatives

Leadership

• Ensure that the area of responsibility is properly organized, staffed and directed
• Guide, motivate and develop the directly and indirectly subordinate employees
• Plan, implement and control the cost and project budget in the area of responsibility; initiate and steer corrective actions in case of deviations

Knowledge, Skills and Experience

• Culinary degree from an accredited Culinary School
• Minimum 5 years of professional commercial cooking experience in a high-volume or specialty kitchen environment; preparing authentic specialty cuisine.
• Prior airline catering experience a plus but not required.
• Proficient in authentic Chinese cooking techniques and preparing Chinese cuisine.
• Chinese language proficiency
• Customer interactive dialog in preferred language
• Understand and demonstrate concepts of financial controls (ex: keep food cost within budget, control stock levels while being cost conscious, minimize waste)
• Excellent skills at developing concepts, ensuring documentation and conducting professional and convincing menu presentations in front of customers
• Proficient Microsoft Excel and/or database application experience and demonstrated skill set
• Ability to follow airline plating guides, recipe specifications, and food presentation standards.
• Work in refrigerated environment when required to ensure specifications are followed
• Able to lift up and carry up to 50 lbs to include hot pans of food.