Okuzeka
Culinary Arts & Cooking vocabulary · Kitchen Brigade & Roles

Kitchen porter

Meaning in culinary arts & cooking, with examples

/ˈkɪtʃɪn ˌpɔːtə/nounCommon term

In culinary arts & cooking, kitchen porter means: A kitchen worker who washes dishes, pots and equipment, keeps the kitchen clean, takes out rubbish and helps with deliveries and basic prep.

In Turkish: bulaşıkçı, mutfak yardımcısı, steward

How it is used

British English, often shortened to KP. Americans usually say dishwasher (also the machine). Hotels call this department stewarding and the staff stewards. A good KP keeps the whole kitchen moving during service.

Example sentences

  1. The kitchen porter needs the big pots back before we close.

  2. We're short of a kitchen porter tonight, so everyone helps with the pans.

Common collocations

  • kitchen porter (KP)
  • head kitchen porter
  • dishwasher
  • stewarding department
  • back of houseThe areas of a restaurant that guests do not see, such as the kitchen, storerooms and dishwashing area, and the staff who work there.
  • brigade systemThe traditional way of organising a professional kitchen into a clear chain of command and sections, developed by the French chef Auguste Escoffier in the late 19th century.
  • clean as you goThe working habit of cleaning your station, tools and spills continuously while you cook, instead of leaving all the cleaning until the end.
  • sanitizeTo reduce the number of germs on a clean surface or piece of equipment to a safe level, using heat or a chemical product called a sanitizer.

More terms: Kitchen Brigade & Roles

Practise with graded reading

Reading at the right level is the fastest way to make new words stick. Pick free English books by level: