Question
Lotte van Lopik
What jobs could you do after culinary school besides working as a professional chef in a restaurant?
Answer
I'll name a few because I'm sure I'm going to miss a whole bunch. Okay? But it could be writing associated with food. It could be photography associated with food. There's hands-on food work in many different contexts. There's the age of the people that you're cooking for, like retirement homes or kindergartens or preschools, and then everything in between. Or preparing meals for different people in those age groups, not in educational settings, but like a food prep company would, or a meal prep company. Or you can go into someone's home and cook meals, or you can cook meals at your place and then deliver meals. That can help a busy parent that might have children, or that might help an elderly person in the neighborhood who doesn't have the time or the ability to cook those meals. Or they can be for families or people in between on that gradation of age. Folks that don't want to cook, don't have time to cook, don't know how to cook, and would love you to cook for them. So those are always options. Gosh, there are cooking classes otherwise that are open to groups of the public, and I have done that on a volunteer basis. I've done that for a small stipend in different places over the years, whether it's the Bob's Red Mill cooking school here in Southeast Portland, which is closed now, but was around for many years, and other similar outlets. Anyway, those are a few that come to mind. Again, think about just other places in your world where food emerges, okay? Where you see food, and maybe it's an intersection with a hobby that you have, then those are places where potentially you could step in and do something. Okay? Writing. I mentioned writing, but writing can take place in many different forms, whether it's a blog that you produce, or a blog that somebody else produces and you're a guest writer. Perhaps it's a local newspaper in print, or a newspaper online, which is most of them these days, big or small. Many organizations have newsletters. I used to write for the monthly newsletter of a private golf club. So there are just so many different outlets or different avenues in these different category areas that intersect with food in some sort or another. So give it a thought. Keep your eyes open to your environment, and hopefully you'll start to see where food pops up, and you'll be able to see these intersections with your own areas of interest, and you'll be able to pursue these or to reach out and inquire, maybe conduct some informational interviews with people in those spaces to see how you might further carve out some enjoyable and meaningful work for you. All right?
