Teaching science to chefs: The benefits, challenges and opportunities

The science of cooking is being taught at a small handful of culinary schools across the globe, and there seems to be a general consensus that scientific understanding can be a valuable tool for an aspiring chef. There is however very little information available on how these scientific topics are being disseminated to chefs. In this communication, we will introduce and discuss two chef teaching environments where scientific topics are or have been taught The Culinary Science Laboratory at Westminster Kingsway College in London and the Gastrolab at the University of Southern Denmark in Odense. Our conclusion is that the science of cooking is an important topic valuable for the education of the next generation of chefs, but there are challenges associated with teaching this academic subject in a vocational setting, and we feel that further research should be done to look into the methodology of teaching science in the kitchen, and that there is a need to develop a standardized syllabus for the delivery of this subject.