Tasting Notes Program

The Tasting Notes program is an ongoing quality feedback program for shefs on Weekly Shef Service. Every few months, a member of the Shef culinary team will sample your food and send you a Tasting Notes form with feedback designed to help you improve your dishes and grow your business.

We created this program because so many of you told us you wanted more direct, professional feedback after going live on the platform. Tasting Notes is our investment in giving you that — a free, recurring resource (offered on a limited basis) from a dedicated industry professional whose job is to help your food shine.

Every few months or so, someone on the Shef culinary team will order and sample dishes from your menu. After the tasting, you'll receive a written Tasting Notes feedback form with their observations and suggestions.

Feedback focuses primarily on culinary suggestions — flavor, technique, balance, presentation — but the form will also cover the operational details we most often hear about from customers, including:

Tasting Notes is intended to be an additional resource: a chance to get a fresh, expert perspective on your dishes from an industry professional.

In the occasional event that a Tasting suggests that a shef's dishes are altogether not meeting the culinary bar that we have at Shef, we will review the shef's standing more holistically. Not meeting the culinary bar, in addition to not meeting reliability standards, are grounds for delisting from the platform.

Both of these actions are meant to help preserve the quality of the overall Shef community, and to ensure that every shef on the Weekly Shef Service is being showcased only amongst high-quality peers.

How often will I be tasted? Roughly every few months. The exact cadence varies depending on culinary team capacity.

Will I know in advance when a tasting is happening? No. Tastings are conducted as regular customer orders so that the experience reflects what your customers actually receive — same packaging, same reheating instructions, same dishes off your live menu.

Who is doing the tasting? Members of the Shef culinary team — industry trained professionals whose role is to evaluate and support food quality across the platform.

What does the Tasting Notes form include? Written culinary feedback on the dishes that were sampled, plus notes on portioning, packaging, and reheating instructions where relevant. Suggestions are specific and actionable.

Do I have to make the changes the culinary team suggests? We ask that you address the feedback around container type, packaging, and portion size, as we have baseline expectations that need to stay consistent across the platform. On culinary feedback, our feedback is intended as thought partnership, and can be up to your interpretation.

What happens if a tasting goes poorly? A single piece of critical feedback isn't a problem — it's the point of the program. If a tasting suggests your dishes are not meeting Shef's culinary bar overall, we'll review your standing on the platform more holistically before taking any action.

Can I request a tasting? Not at this time. Tastings are scheduled by the culinary team.

Who do I contact with questions about my Tasting Notes? Reply directly to the Tasting Notes form you received, or reach out to the Shef Success team. For shefs whose feedback is a little more extensive, we've also offered culinary workshopping calls to answer questions more directly. You can find the link in the email with your Tasting Notes.