Head Chef, Arena Hall

Location: Arena Hall, Austin, Texas - full-time, on-site

Start date: January 2027

Reports to: F&B Director

Compensation: $90,000-$95,000, performance incentive and healthcare plan

About Arena Hall

Arena Hall is a private members club opening in Austin in March 2027 - a space built for founders, operators and high-caliber thinkers who show up not just to discuss the future, but to build it together.

A 22,000-square-foot restored church on a 50,000-square-foot campus, Arena Hall will offer full member dining and bar service, private dining, and an ambitious events program for a community of people doing serious work in the world.

The kitchen is at the centre of the club’s social life - not as a destination dining room, but as the engine of a daily food and social experience. Our food philosophy is fresh, local and organic wherever possible: sourced with integrity, prepared with care, and served in a way that makes people feel uplifted, nourished and conducive to great conversations. The format is simple yet refined.

The Role

The Head Chef leads the Arena Hall kitchen while remaining an active, daily part of it. This is a hands-on leadership role: you will develop menus, build relationships with producers and suppliers, manage food costs and kitchen systems, and cook alongside your team through preparation and service.

We expect to open with a deliberately lean kitchen team. We are looking for someone who enjoys the intimacy, discipline and resourcefulness of a small kitchen rather than someone accustomed to managing a large brigade from a distance.

The food should be sophisticated without being complicated: fresh, seasonal, local and organic wherever possible, nutritionally thoughtful, deeply ingredient-led, with quality vegetables and proteins as protagonists. Above all, it must be genuinely delicious. We want someone for whom conscious cooking is already second nature, not a philosophy they would need to learn.

The kitchen will support more than daily member dining. Arena Hall hosts private dining, meetings and a dynamic events programs in 2 locations, including catered events. The Head Chef must build an operation flexible enough to move naturally across these formats without compromising food quality, consistency or identity.

The Head Chef reports to the F&B Director and works closely with the GM to deliver the overall member experience.

What You Will Own

1. Menu & Culinary Development

• Develop seasonal menus across morning offerings, all-day dining, lunch, dinner, Sunday brunch, private dining, meetings and events.
• Shape menus around Arena Hall’s food philosophy, prioritizing good quality, seasonal, local and organic ingredients wherever possible.
• Establish recipes, portion sizes and presentation standards to ensure consistent quality across all service formats.
• Balance creativity, member preferences, ingredient availability and the capabilities of a lean kitchen team.
• Accommodate dietary requirements and allergies while preserving the integrity of the food.
• Build strong relationships with Austin and Texas farms, ranches and suppliers, allowing seasonality and product quality to inform the menus.
• Select suppliers based on ingredient quality, provenance, reliability, sustainability and pricing.
• Oversee purchasing and ordering, ensuring product availability while avoiding overstocking and unnecessary waste.

3. Kitchen Operations & Service

• Lead daily preparation, production, service and close-down, remaining hands-on alongside the team, particularly during peak periods and events.
• Coordinate workflows between the downstairs main production kitchen and upstairs preparation kitchen.
• Establish efficient preparation schedules, production plans and operating procedures suited to a lean team, according to demand and events.
• Coordinate with the F&B Director, GM and front-of-house team on covers, reservations, service timing and special requests.
• Specify kitchen equipment and oversee its operational readiness, maintenance and efficient use.
• Manage food costs within agreed targets through accurate recipe costing, portion control, purchasing and inventory management.
• Forecast food requirements based on anticipated covers, member activity and event schedules.