Great chefs have one thing in common - a mastery of the fundamentals of cooking and baking.

The Diploma of Essential Professional Culinary Skills is specifically designed to provide aspiring chefs with the skills and techniques they need to enter and excel in the competitive profession of cooking.

In developing the Diploma of Essential Professional Culinary Skills program, the Professional Culinary Institute of California has taken inspiration from the European apprentice training system of "explanation, demonstration, and execution," by creating the Artisense Method for Culinary Instruction. Students in this program will not be asked to prepare anything that has not been demonstrated to them first by our chef-instructors, as they are led through a discipline of classical techniques which form the essentials of the culinary arts.

Students in our Culinary Arts program will receive detailed, personal instruction in subjects such as knife skills, appetizers, soups, sauces, vegetables, garde manger, charcuterie, entres, breads, pastries, and more. They'll learn about the physiology of taste and smell, how to properly butcher, fabricate, and handle meats, poultry, and fish, and gain an intimate knowledge of foods and ingredients indigenous to the regions of Asia, Europe, Africa, the Middle East, and the Americas.

Finally, a paid externship in a professional foodservice establishment will complete your preparation for a career in culinary arts.

For class schedules, course descriptions, pricing and other information, click here or fill out the form on the right.

Our chefs want you to succeed and they have created the Professional Culinary Institute of California to allow you to do so.