Research & Development Chef

Jeni’s Splendid Ice Creams is a creative-led, community-spirited company on a mission to make better ice creams and bring people together. More than that — we believe flavor is everything. It’s the way we make ice creams like no one else can. How we aren’t afraid to go our own way, lean into our curiosities, and are guided by our imaginations. It’s in our ability to build community wherever we go. 

We are searching for a talented and like-minded R&D Chef to join our internal Research & Development Team and help us create one-of-a-kind flavors. 

The R&D Chef combines a passion for culinary techniques and food/science with a deep knowledge of flavor, and a flair for creativity, developing concepts, creating recipes, and producing benchtop samples as the first step in bringing new flavors to life (the commercialization process). The R&D Chef, with guidance from the Director of Innovation and Senior R&D Manager, will support formulation, product specifications, and benchtop/prototype work to ensure super premium quality product. The ideal candidate also has a working knowledge of food safety. Occasionally this job will be glam; most of the time it will not. The right person for this position will joyfully tackle both aspects of the role.

Responsibilities:

• Based on creative inputs from the Director of Innovation and flavor innovation team, translate concepts into benchtop samples for approval. Approved “bench recipes” will be translated into commercial formulas for use by our Production Kitchen and Manufacturing Partners

• Be an active participant in the flavor innovation team. The ideal candidate has an enthusiasm for pitching fresh flavor ideas and will help push, pull, and edit the ideas of others on the team — always to make the best possible ice creams.

• Conduct investigative sourcing for new product concepts requiring unique ingredients. In conjunction with Sourcing and Food Safety teams, coordinate the initial viability screening of potential production partners

• Document all flavor development and recipe work to be used for reference in the commercial process, keeping a detailed record and notebook of all working formulas

• Work on effective ways to retain flavor, texture, nutritional content, and product design throughout the manufacturing process and to the end of the product’s shelf life

• Work with the Quality team to ensure that all products meet the “gold standard” at the end of the product’s shelf life, primarily communicated via fully-documented product specification

• Support Operations and production partner teams with recipe improvement projects based on issues during commercial production

• Use customer and consumer product feedback throughout all channels of trade to improve our product performance. Support the customer advocates by answering product/ingredient-related questions

• Keep the lab organized and clean, maintain all ingredients and benchtop/prototype samples up to date

Qualifications: 

• Culinary degree is required

• Soon-to-be graduates from food science and culinary arts programs will be considered. The ideal candidate will have culinary experience (dairy experience a plus)

• Knowledge of ingredient functionality and food processing

• Culinary, food styling, and trend analysis skills

• Sensory analysis, consumer research, and prototype development abilities

• Experience with formulation development and scaling, concept translation, and development documentation capabilities

• Project management and presentation skills

• Excellent written & verbal communication abilities

• Must be proactive, always willing to continuously learn, solutions-driven, and self-motivated

• Proficient in numbers/analytics, particularly Google Sheet/Excel

• Ability to multitask and prioritize in a fast-paced environment

• Labeling experience is a plus

• Ice cream knowledge is a plus

The position is eligible for the following benefits:

• Competitive compensation

• Excellent insurance (health, dental, vision, dental) 

• Paid time off, including sick, vacation, and holiday pay 

• 401k participation and 4% match on 401k contributions after 3 months of employment 

• A one-month paid sabbatical after 3 years of continuous service 

• Annual paid day to volunteer for a non-profit organization that matters to you 

• 50% discount at Jeni’s Scoop Shops and online

Jeni's is an equal opportunity employer. Said our way, we love and honor differences, and we love sharing common values such as talent, hustle, guts, resilience, and empathy. Our differences are a primary source of our team's strength and we crave having a team rich with diversity which is creativity and art in its human form.