NYC wages

[witman]

:o  wondering about average wages - 10 years experiece in fine dining and upscale food. Can any one give assistance?

[glenn]

It depends on the position and type of restaurant.  In general, I've found restaurant employees in NYC to be extremely well compensated except for kitchen help - to the point of being way overpaid.

[witman]

unfortunately Im looking for kitchen position. I'm looking for a sous chef position and my wife either pastry chef or assistant pastry chef under well knownn chef..we just want to see how much we could afford for rent.

[glenn]

It can't hurt to look.  Another thing I found is that there's a great disparity among restaurants.  You can easily do a search of the NY Times classified (the main source for such jobs)  online:

NY Times Job Search

[jordan]

It depends on the restaurant and your experience.  As a rule of thumb Fine Dining Sous are earning $35-45k.  However for the right person and in the right restaurant I know of Sous who earn upwards of $65k.  For a Pastry Chef a rule of thumb would be $40-60k, but again the right person/establishment can earn upwards of $80k.  In my experience most pastry assistants are employed on an hourly basis and again depending on the situation it can range from $9/hr to $16/hr.  If you don't have something lined up and you don't have solid connections in the city, don't plan on getting top dollar.  An other alternative is working as a freelance cook/pastry cook for catering companies.  The work can be sporadic but the pay is very good $18-28/hr based on a min 5hrs per job.  If you can get yourself networked with a few quality companies the work can be steady and has lead to permanent positions.  This is also a good way to get into private chef gigs.

[Steve Klc]

If I could just followup a bit after Jordan's excellent post--much depends on the volume of an establishment.  There are pastry sous chefs making 55K+ in NYC working in high-volume, high staff positions--while some "name" restaurants are hiring students right out of school and low-balling them in return for the title of "pastry chef." Hotels usually pay more, then there are union shops and foodservice Restaurant Associate-type positions, and restaurants pay the least. Hourly pastry rates will be $9 to 12, especially if you are trying to work under a "top" pastry chef to learn.  With all the free help and interns you don't need to pay much more.  In fact, as more and more NYC restaurants stop trying to do excellent desserts and cut pastry staffs and pastry budgets accordingly, salaries will only drop.  There's becoming less of a willingness on the part of restaurant owners and chefs to expend serious effort on the pastry side.

This is an interesting time in NYC right now--I'm getting lots of reports from students and friends that human resources departments at several elite properties in the city have been playing games with them, there are alot of experienced NYC people who don't have work and are doing anything to stay involved, to keep their hands and minds busy while they wait and hope for the right, rewarding opportunity to open up.

Keep us in the loop as your adventure continues.