Roles and responsibilities  

1. Menu Planning and Development:

• Creating and updating menus that reflect seasonal ingredients, customer preferences, and culinary trends.
• Select and buy the necessary organic and sustainable ingredients for preparing meals.
• Ability to work with local ingredients and adapt menus to regional tastes and dietary restrictions.
• Familiarity with Mozambican or Southern African cuisine is a plus.
• Work with the Residence Manager to promote the use of British products at official functions.

2.Food Preparation and Cooking:

• Preparing and cooking dishes to the highest standards, ensuring consistency and quality in every plate.
• Design menus suitable for formal functions, diplomatic receptions and day to day requirements
• Cater for diverse dietary needs and cultural preferences.

3.Kitchen Management:

• Supervising outsourced kitchen staff, managing inventory, and ensuring compliance with health and safety regulations.
• Understanding of food hygiene standards and safe kitchen practices. 

4.Cost Control:

• Managing food costs, minimizing waste, and optimizing the use of ingredients.
• Actively seek out and compare prices of food stock to ensure quality, and value for money.
• Skills in managing limited catering resources, and to work with temporary accommodation setups and limited kitchen equipment if required.
• Negotiate effectively with external vendors and contractors, to ensure that we get excellent value for money.

5. Customer Interaction:

• occasionally interacting with customers to receive feedback and adjust the menu or service as needed.
• Clear communication with household staff or other team members, especially in multilingual environments.
• Readiness to manage catering for events or households with varying schedules and expectations.
• The successful candidate may be required to provide wider Residence support e.g. helping with set-up for major events.

6. Health, Safety & Hygiene:

• Implement safe practices in food handling, storage, and preparation.
• Ensure the kitchen and storage areas meet the highest hygiene standards and sanitation regulation.
• Maintain cleanliness and organized kitchen and all utensils of the kitchen.

Resources managed (staff and expenditure):

The job holder will not have any direct staff management responsibilities but will coordinate with extra Chef during events that requires one.

• Culinary Certification or Equivalent Experience
• Proven experience as a Chef with at least 3 years of experience providing catering at a higher level
• IT literacy (proficiency in MS Word, Outlook and Excel)
• Good oral communication, team-working and self-management skills
• Delivering under pressure, on time and with high quality
• Excellent kitchen management and food hygiene control, leadership skills
• fluency in Portuguese and basic English is required