Culinary development manager - casual dining - orange county, ca

30th September, 2026

Location: Huntington Beach, CA.

Salary: $90,000–$115,000.

Benefits: Medical, dental, vision, PTO.

High-Volume Multi-Unit Restaurant Group seeks a Culinary Development Manager to lead hands-on R&D and scalable menu innovation.

Qualifications: 4–5+ years of corporate culinary R&D, menu development, product development, or culinary innovation experience. Proven ability to take concepts from research and recipe development through prototyping, presentation, and implementation support. Multi-unit restaurant experience with strong savory culinary skills, recipe standardization, food costing, and scalable execution. Strong career stability preferred, with the ability to work independently approximately four days per week onsite.

Responsibilities: Develop new menu items, seasonal offerings, and LTOs from initial brief through research, prototyping, refinement, and presentation. Create and standardize recipes within ingredient, equipment, food cost, labor, and operational parameters for high-volume execution. Partner with Marketing, Supply Chain, Operations, and culinary leadership throughout the development and implementation process. Research culinary trends, present concepts to leadership, and support successful systemwide menu rollouts.