How Much Does a Personal Chef Cost?

When organizing an event, you might want to hire a chef for it.

A personal chef can cook any type of delicious meal for any number of guests. Besides, they will contribute to creating a unique atmosphere for the special occasion.

Main image by The Storyteller Agency.co on Unsplash

From this article, you’ll get to know the advantages of hiring a private chef in London and the rest of the UK. Plus, you’ll learn about the personal chef cost and the factors that can influence the prices.

Who is a Private Chef?

A private or personal chef is a person who has a culinary degree and experience in cooking.

Some chefs start their careers in restaurants and then switch to freelancing. Others might start as private family cooks and then embrace a new format.

The difference between chef vs cook consists of the following. The former knows how to save you from hunger. They can prepare tasty and wholesome meals for clients with any budget.

Even if a cook has just the most basic products at their disposal, they will still be able to make a decent dinner.

Private chefs add style to their workflow. They cook more sophisticated meals and they hone their plating skills. Their creations might look like small pieces of art.

When you rent a chef, you don’t expect them to deliver just the taste and the calories - they should appeal to your emotions too.

When you book a venue for your event, they might offer you chef service. Alternatively, you might want to get in touch with a private chef agency or look for ads online.

How Much Does a Personal Chef Cost?

If you search for prices to hire a personal chef for you, you’ll find out that the minimum personal chef cost in the UK is £180 and the maximum cost for a private chef in the UK is £250.

So if you want to get a chef in the UK in 2021, you should be ready to pay around £200 on average. 

5 Factors that Influence Prices

When you book a chef for a day, the price that you need to pay might vary considerably depending on the following factors.

Food Style

If you hire a private chef for a dinner party, you might want them to specialize in haute cuisine.

This professional will need to invest their time and effort not only in cooking but also in aesthetics. They will create visually appealing, highly instagrammable meals.

And if you want to book a cook for a picnic, they might do without elaborate presentations because you’ll need to transport the food over a long distance. The meals that you’ll get will be head and shoulders above your average sandwiches!

Type of Event

If you look for the cost of a personal chef for a dinner party or a personal chef for a formal dinner, that would normally cost you more than hiring a cook for an intimate friend gathering. The more requirements the chef needs to meet, the more they would charge.

Number of Dishes

The more dishes you want, the higher the private chef’s salary will be. To avoid overfeeding your guests, you might opt for a tasting menu instead of full servings.

Small portions look stunning on photos and they will enable you to try a bit of everything.

Cuisine

It should be very easy to find a chef who can prepare superb homemade food, comfort food, or salads. But if you want a professional who specializes in African food, premium seafood, or creative desserts, your choice of candidates might be limited.

Dietary Requests

Today, it’s close to impossible to find a person who would eat just anything. Some are allergic to gluten, and others avoid sugar. Some eat only local and seasonal products, while others stick to raw food.

Before you book a chef, you should ask everyone whom you invite about their nutritional preferences. Compile a list, send it to the chef and ask whether they could meet all these demands.

Typically, professionals who frequently cook for events should be rather versatile. The more diverse the menu should be, the more you should be ready to pay.

Why is a Personal Chef worth it?

If you need a chef for a dinner party or another festive occasion, you’ll benefit from it in the following ways.

1. You can be sure that every meal is delicious…

2. ...and incredibly good-looking.

3. You’ll be able to cater to the tastes and demands of all your guests, including vegans, vegetarians, adherents of the keto diet, and so on.

4. The attendants of the event will be impressed by how classy it is!

5. You’ll save a lot of precious time that you can devote to other useful tasks.

Plus, it might be more cost-efficient to hire a chef for the night than to cook everything yourself. 

1. Some chefs might recommend you the best product suppliers who would offer them discounts. 

2. An experienced personal chef in the UK will help you to calculate very precisely how many products you need to buy (professionals might call it “cook on costs”). You won’t have too many leftovers and you won’t need to buy additional items at the very last moment.

3. If you tell your mobile chef straightforwardly that you would like to cut down expenses, they might recommend budget-friendly alternatives to certain meals or ingredients.

As you see, personal chefs can make your life much easier and more enjoyable.

Final Thoughts

Hopefully, this article came in handy, and now you have a better understanding of who a private chef is and how much it costs to hire one.

If you’re planning to organize an event, it would be much more reasonable to hire a chef in London or other parts of the UK than cook everything yourself or buy pre-cooked meals.

An experienced chef will ensure that all our guests will have only the best memories of your event!