College Life

Private Schools That Are Well Known for This Major

• The Texas Culinary Academy
• Institute of Culinary Education
• California Culinary Academy
• Johnson and Wales University
• International Culinary Center

State Schools That Are Well Known for This Major

• Oklahoma State University Institute of Technology
• University of Nevada—Las Vegas
• University of New Hampshire
• University of Montana

Classes in the Major

Principles of Nutrition. If you're going to be serving people their breakfast, lunch, and dinner, you should know a thing or two about nutrition. Although many of us would love to eat nothing but Ho Hos and Ding Dongs all day long, they're not what we'd call "sustenance." In nutrition classes, you'll learn why sugar—despite how delicious it is—shouldn't be a staple in a person's diet. You'll also learn why we need to eat protein and carbohydrates from time to time. (We know you've heard carbs are the devil, but it's just not true.)

Principles and Techniques. This will serve as your introduction to real-deal cooking, and not just whipping together some Ragu 'n' noodles. From soup stocks to paring knives, here's where you'll learn the ins and outs of the kitchen. If you think you can bake a quiche, pie, and pizza in the same size pan at the same temperature, you're going to be in for a long semester. In addition, you'll discover that not every chef uses the same measurements and techniques, so learning to convert measurements and choosing a style that suits you will be essential. Paula Deen, obviously, chose butter as her style, and look where she is.

Baking and Pastry. Here's where you'll learn the principles of making sweet treats, which will come in super handy at potlucks or when it's 3:00AM and you've got a deadly macadamia-nut cookie craving. While your peers might be taking notes on psychological theory or creating an electromagnetic current in a lab, you'll be squeezing Bavarian cream into a freshly baked batch of cream puffs. You'll need to pay attention to aesthetics here, because people love to marvel at the beauty of their dessert…before scarfing it down.

Hospitality Management. Learning about the management side of cooking is an important part of the biz. Top chefs like Gordon Ramsay aren't just famous because they're great chefs (or because they like to yell), but because they know how to bring in customers and keep them coming. You'll likely get an overview in accounting, human resources, finance, public relations, and customer service. But don't worry about learning every little trick of the trade—most of that work will be left to hospitality and tourism majors. However, having a background in hospitality will serve you well later on in your career, especially if you want to enter restaurant management.

Restaurant Management. When you're making piles of money creating beautiful and complex dishes for hoards of hungry customers, you'll be glad you learned the operations side of running a restaurant. If you thought you could only work with food and be wildly successful, we've got some bad news. Often, restaurant owners and executive chefs are the ones who really run the show. So if you want to have complete control of your creations, you're going to have to know a thing or two about how to set up and manage a restaurant, as well as its staff.