Find a Chef: Learn from the Best, Teach What You Love

Whether you want to master a new technique before your next competition or share your signature dish with eager learners, Dine With Me has a feature built just for that. It's called Find a Chef, and it connects food lovers who want to learn with talented cooks who want to teach.

Here's everything you need to know about how it works — and how it can benefit you on both sides of the kitchen.

What Is Find a Chef?

Find a Chef is a marketplace within Dine With Me where users can discover cooking lessons offered by other members of the community. Think of it as a meeting point between people who love to cook and people who want to get better at it.

Chefs on the platform range from professional culinary experts with years of experience to passionate home cooks who have perfected a specific dish or technique. You don't need a culinary degree to teach — you just need a recipe worth sharing and the willingness to show someone how it's done.

How It Works

Finding and booking a cooking lesson is straightforward. Here's the process from start to finish:

Learn from Professional & Amateur Chefs

One of the best things about Find a Chef is the variety. You're not limited to one type of instructor:

• Professional chefs bring formal training, restaurant experience, and deep knowledge of specific cuisines. They're ideal if you want to learn advanced techniques like sauce reductions, proper knife skills, or plating that looks like it belongs in a fine dining restaurant.
• Amateur chefs (passionate home cooks) often specialize in comfort food, family recipes, and regional dishes that you won't find in textbooks. They bring warmth, personal stories, and the kind of hands-on knowledge that comes from cooking the same dish hundreds of times.

Both types of chefs are valuable. A professional might teach you the technique, while an amateur might teach you the soul of a dish. Many users book lessons with both.

The best cooks aren't always the ones with degrees. Sometimes the most memorable lessons come from someone who learned their grandmother's recipe by heart.

Level Up Your Competition Game

If you're already participating in Dine With Me competitions, Find a Chef can give you a serious advantage. Here's how:

• Learn new cuisines — Surprise judges by cooking something outside your comfort zone. A lesson in Thai or Moroccan cuisine could set your dish apart.
• Perfect your technique — Struggling with pastry dough or sushi rice? A single focused lesson can make a huge difference in your execution.
• Improve presentation — Presentation is one of the core rating categories. Chefs can teach you plating techniques that turn a good dish into a winning one.
• Build confidence — Cooking under pressure is easier when you've practiced with someone who knows what they're doing. Lessons help you feel prepared, not panicked.

Turn Your Passion Into Income

Find a Chef isn't just for learners. If you have a dish you're proud of — whether it's your famous lasagna, a perfect pad thai, or an heirloom family recipe — you can teach it and earn money doing it.

Here's how becoming a chef on Dine With Me works:

• Create a listing — Describe your recipe, set a difficulty level, choose your cuisine type, upload a photo, and set your price (between 20 and 500 in your currency: EUR, USD, GBP, or BRL).
• Set your availability — Pick the dates and time slots when you're free to teach. You control your schedule completely.
• Define your capacity — Choose how many students you can take per lesson (1 to 20). Smaller groups mean more personalized attention; larger groups mean more earnings per session.
• Get booked — Students find your listing, book a slot, and pay through the platform. You receive your earnings automatically.

You can list as many recipes as you want, so if you have five signature dishes, create five listings. Each one reaches a different audience.

Teaching doesn't require perfection. It requires passion. If you love cooking and can explain your process, there's someone out there who wants to learn from you.

Getting Started

Whether you want to learn or teach, getting started takes just a few minutes.

As a Student

As a Chef

That's it. Whether you're looking to gain a competitive edge, discover a new cuisine, or make some extra money doing what you love, Find a Chef has you covered. The kitchen is waiting.