I'd wager that more than one food blogger - excluding those who are already pro chefs in some capacity - have considered going to culinary school. With the rise of Food TV and the ever-increasing interest in cooking, it's likely than many of you readers have had the same thought. How can you tell if culinary school is the right decision for you? The answer is that you can't. The only real way to know if it is for you, whether you are a student just finishing high school or someone with an established career and looking for a change a bit later in life, is to do as much research as you can and to go for it if it still seems like the right thing to do.
Doing the research usually means talking to schools, reading lots of literature, working (possibly for free) in real kitchens to see how they operate and what the work environments after school might be like. Don't just look out for what you want to hear; look for the potential downsides so that you know what you're headed for with both eyes open.
A great place to start is with the sound advice of David Lebovitz, who says that "Should I go to culinary school?" is one of the most frequently asked questions that he gets. He wrote up a little overview of some of the questions you need to ask yourself before you take the plunge.
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