Why the Future of Our Profession Is Brighter Than We Think
By Chef Ben Kiely, Senior Education Administrator & Lead Chef Instructor,
Every summer at the Pacific Institute of Culinary Arts (PICA), our teaching kitchens come alive with a different kind of energy. During our Teen Culinary Camps, young people willingly trade part of their summer holidays for chef Pacific Institute of Culinary Arts (PICA)jackets, aprons, cutting boards and long days in the kitchen.
Some arrive having watched hundreds of cooking videos online. Others have spent years cooking alongside parents or grandparents. A few are simply curious, unsure whether they belong in a professional kitchen at all.
Within a matter of days, something remarkable begins to happen. Their confidence grows. Their questions become more thoughtful. They begin to understand that cooking is about far more than following recipes or recreating something they have seen on social media. It is about discipline, observation, teamwork, problem-solving and repetition.
This year, one thing stood out more than ever not only the enthusiasm, but the numbers.
For an industry that has spent years asking where the next generation of chefs will come from, the answer may already be standing in our classrooms.
After more than a decade of teaching aspiring chefs, this remains one of the most rewarding parts of my profession. Every year I hear concerns from chefs and restaurateurs about the next generation. They are said to lack resilience, patience or commitment. Yet those criticisms have been aimed at almost every generation entering the workforce.
What I see every day tells a different story.
I see students arriving early because they want more practice. I see them staying behind to perfect a knife cut or ask one more question. I see them celebrating one another’s successes and supporting classmates when things don’t go to plan. I see resilience developing through the simple process of trying, failing, learning and trying again.
But when we talk about the “next generation,” we should be careful not to define it purely by age.
The demographic of trade education itself is changing. For decades, university was often presented as the default route to success, while apprenticeships and vocational education were unfairly viewed as second choices. Today, that perception is shifting.
At PICA, we welcome recent high school graduates, university graduates looking for a more practical or creative career, professionals changing direction after years in another industry, international students from around the world and people pursuing a passion for food later in life.
There is no longer one traditional pathway into hospitality.
Some students have dreamed of becoming chefs since childhood. Others discover their passion much later. They arrive with different experiences, expectations and ways of learning, but they share something important: a willingness to learn.
That diversity should be seen as a strength.
One of the greatest advantages today’s students have is access to information. Never before have aspiring chefs been exposed to so much culinary knowledge before entering a professional kitchen. They can watch Michelin-starred chefs online, explore cuisines from around the world through social media and increasingly use artificial intelligence to research ingredients, techniques and culinary science.
But they also learn one important lesson very quickly.
Watching isn’t doing.
The first time a student makes hollandaise, fabricates a chicken, fillets a fish or attempts to temper chocolate, the difference becomes obvious. A video can explain a technique, but it cannot develop muscle memory. Artificial intelligence can suggest a recipe, but it cannot tell you by smell that butter has reached beurre noisette or by touch that a piece of fish is perfectly cooked.
As I often tell my students, social media can inspire a chef, but only a kitchen can train one.
Professional cooking is built through repetition, consistency and experience. Knife skills improve because you cut hundreds of onions. Sauces become consistent because you make them repeatedly. Confidence grows because you experience mistakes, understand why they happened and learn how to correct them.
Those qualities cannot be streamed, downloaded or generated. They are earned.
That reality has also changed the way we teach.
The fundamentals of culinary education remain remarkably consistent, but our teaching methods must continue to evolve. Today’s students often engage best when information is purposeful, concise and immediately reinforced through practical application.
Rather than expecting students to sit through lengthy lectures before entering the kitchen, we can introduce a concept, demonstrate it clearly and allow them to experience it while the information is still fresh.
Explain. Demonstrate. Practice. Coach. Repeat.
Instead of talking about emulsions for half an hour, explain the science, demonstrate the technique and then let students make mayonnaise or hollandaise while an instructor coaches them through the process.
After all, nobody becomes a better cook simply by listening. Learning happens by doing. One comparison I often make with students is that learning to cook is like progressing through the levels of a video game. You don’t begin on the final level.
You learn the controls. You understand the mechanics. You develop skills and gradually take on more difficult challenges.
Culinary education works in much the same way. Knife skills become the foundation for vegetable preparation. Vegetable preparation supports stocks. Stocks become sauces. Individual techniques become complete dishes. Timing develops organisation, and organisation eventually creates confidence.
Students often arrive wanting to recreate the beautiful dishes they have seen online, but they quickly discover that those plates are built on hundreds of smaller skills developed over time.
Before creativity comes structure.
Technique gives students the freedom to create because they understand what is happening to the food and why.
That is also why we should not place too much emphasis on examinations at the beginning of the learning journey. Assessments have their place, but education is about much more than passing a test. The real learning happens in repetition, small corrections, failed attempts and gradual improvements that students often don’t recognise until they look back at where they started.
Once students have a strong technical foundation, we can begin giving them room to think independently. We can challenge them to adapt a dish for a dietary restriction, substitute seasonal ingredients, reduce food waste or create something from limited resources.
There isn’t always one correct answer.
That’s intentional.
Professional kitchens rarely present problems with a single solution. Chefs need to think, adapt and solve problems under pressure. Our goal should not simply be to produce cooks who can follow recipes. It should be to develop cooks who understand why recipes work.
Some of the most valuable lessons come when things don’t go according to plan.
A split hollandaise, an overworked pastry or a broken emulsion can sometimes teach more than perfect execution. Students discover that experienced chefs did not become skilled by avoiding mistakes. They became skilled by making mistakes, understanding them and learning how to recover.
The learning lies in the process, not simply the outcome.
One of the greatest privileges of teaching is watching confidence develop in real time. Students who arrive uncertain about holding a chef’s knife can leave preparing dishes they never imagined they could create. The transformation isn’t purely technical. They become better communicators, stronger teammates and more confident problem-solvers.
Technology will continue to evolve, and students will continue learning from social media, online videos and artificial intelligence. Those can all be valuable resources. They encourage curiosity and expose students to ideas that previous generations may never have encountered.
But technology cannot replace mentorship.
It cannot stand beside a student, taste a sauce and explain what is missing. It cannot notice the hesitation in someone’s technique and show them a better way. It cannot recognise the moment when confidence finally replaces doubt.
Those moments happen between people.
Perhaps the biggest change I’ve witnessed during my career isn’t the students.
It’s the mentors.
Many experienced chefs trained in kitchens where leadership relied heavily on hierarchy, pressure and, at times, fear. Those kitchens produced remarkable chefs, and there are qualities from that era that should never disappear from our profession: discipline, professionalism, consistency, respect for ingredients and attention to detail.
Those standards remain non-negotiable.
What has changed is how we help people reach them.
Today’s mentors can still expect excellence while spending more time coaching than commanding. We can explain the “why,” encourage thoughtful questions and provide honest feedback that gives students a pathway to improvement rather than simply pointing out mistakes.
Students may still hear, “That’s not good enough.”
But that can be followed by, “Here’s why, and here’s how we make it better.”
That isn’t lowering standards.
It’s raising the quality of teaching.
A positive learning environment should never be confused with an easy one. Students still need to work hard. They still need honest criticism. They still need to understand that punctuality, professionalism, cleanliness, teamwork and consistency are essential to success in our industry.
Maintaining high standards and creating a supportive environment are not opposing ideas. In fact, they should strengthen one another.
The strongest kitchens I’ve experienced are not necessarily the ones built on fear. They’re the ones where people push one another to improve because they share pride in their craft and respect for each other.
Every accomplished chef can usually point to someone who invested time in teaching them someone who corrected them, encouraged them and refused to let them settle for mediocrity.
Eventually, it becomes our turn to do the same.
None of this is intended to dismiss the very real challenges facing restaurants today. Operators and chefs are navigating rising food costs, labour shortages, tighter margins, changing consumer expectations and an increasingly complex business environment.
Those pressures are real.
However, if our first instinct is to blame the next generation for the industry’s challenges, we may be asking the wrong question.
Perhaps the better question is: How do we evolve?
Hospitality has always been built on adaptation. We embrace new ingredients, new equipment, new techniques and new ways of serving our guests. We constantly refine menus and rethink businesses to meet changing expectations.
It only makes sense that the way we recruit, teach, mentor and develop people should evolve as well.
Evolving doesn’t mean lowering standards.
It means becoming better teachers, better mentors and better leaders.
Young chefs still need discipline, accountability and honest feedback. They still need to earn confidence through hard work and consistency. Those principles are timeless. But if we can deliver those lessons in an environment that also values respect, communication and mentorship, we won’t simply develop stronger chefs.
We’ll build stronger teams.
I believe the restaurants that succeed in the years ahead will increasingly be known not only for the food they serve, but for the people they develop. Great kitchens attract passionate cooks when high standards and strong leadership go hand in hand.
Every generation inherits the responsibility of leaving this profession stronger than they found it.
Watching our Teen Culinary Camps each summer gives me genuine optimism about that future. Students arrive enthusiastic, curious and eager to learn. They leave with a greater appreciation for the discipline, teamwork and commitment professional cooking demands. Some may become restaurant owners, executive chefs, educators or entrepreneurs. Others may simply leave as more confident cooks with a deeper respect for the craft.
And when I look beyond the camps and across our classrooms, I see people from different generations, cultures and careers united by the same curiosity.
The next generation of chefs isn’t defined by age.
It’s defined by a willingness to learn.
If we continue to combine the craftsmanship of yesterday with the curiosity, technology and fresh perspectives of today, there is every reason to be optimistic about where hospitality is heading.
The tools will change. The technology will change. The way we teach will continue to change. But the qualities that make a great chef curiosity, discipline, resilience, humility and the desire to improve remain remarkably constant.
I believe before we judge the next generation of chefs, we should remember that they are entering an industry and a world the previous generation helped create. Evolving doesn’t mean lowering our standards or abandoning everything that came before: it means having the wisdom to know what is worth preserving, what needs to change, what should be left behind and where we need to innovate.
The next generation isn’t asking us to lower the bar. They’re asking us to show them the best way to reach it. And from what I see every day in our kitchens at PICA, they’re ready.