Work With Us

Muncaster Castle is one of The Lake District’s most important heritage visitor attractions. Our stunning site includes an impressive castle with centuries of history, plus the associated stables, courtyards and walled gardens, all set in over 70 acres of beautiful gardens and wider estate, with breathtaking views over some of the most famous and picturesque Lake District Fells.

We are home to an important and renowned Hawk and Owl Centre, and many popular seasonal festivals and events. We have been welcoming daily visitors to Muncaster since 1968, and currently host over 60,000 visitors a year, with an ambition to significantly grow this number.

Muncaster has been the home of the Pennington family for an astonishing 800 years, and the family still live in part of the castle, with hands on involvement in the delivery of our visitor offer. Muncaster is very much a family business, including the whole team.

We are currently undergoing a transition from one generation of leadership to another, and alongside this change, we are embarking upon a significant development and growth plan to create a genuine step change for our much loved historic visitor attraction, to establish it as the best within the sector and a priceless gem in the Lake District’s crown.

To help us realise our exciting five-year vision, we are looking for a number of important new team members, in some of the most exciting posts we have ever advertised.

Reporting to, and working alongside Ewan Frost-Pennington as General Manager, the new team members will have a unique chance to help shape the vision of such an important site, lead on many of the new developments and develop the fantastic Muncaster team. This is chance to get in on the ground floor and play an important role in a very exciting part of our 800 year old history.

We believe some of these role present the opportunity of a lifetime, and definitely the opportunity to make a fantastic lifestyle choice.

We will be adding lots of seasonal jobs in the next few weeks so keep checking back.
Please look through our current opportunities and hopefully you will find a role that grabs your attention and your imagination.

Careers at Muncaster Castle

Muncaster Cafes Sous Chef

Role: Muncaster Hospitality Sous Chef
Location: Muncaster Castle & Gardens, Lake District National Park, Cumbria
Sector: Visitor Attraction, Catering, Café, Hospitality
• £26k - £27.5k per annum or equivalent hourly rate
• 40 hrs/week average with seasonal variances
• Additional benefits, fantastic lifestyle
• Generally daytime hours
• Full Time
• Seasonal Fixed Term (March – October 2024) extension possible
• Local Accommodation available

Are you an experienced and dynamic Sous Chef, or a CDP ready for your next step?

Are you looking for a new challenge, helping to lead an exciting phase of development for an important historic visitor attraction and festival/event venue, in one of the most beautiful places in the world – the English Lake District?

Do you want to work in an inspiring and friendly family environment, where you can really make a difference and put your mark on a site with over 800 years of history, working hard but having a lot of fun along the way?

If the answer is yes to all of those questions, and you are looking for what could be the opportunity of a lifetime then you should read on.

Muncaster Castle and Gardens are embarking upon a once in a generation (literally) transformation project and are building a team accordingly. We are looking for a Café Sous Chef to come in on the ground floor and help us realise our vision for this extraordinary site, as great food is at the heart of all visitor attractions and cafés. We have plans for significant café and restaurant expansion, but want to get the right team in place first – so what we currently offer is only the start.

We can also provide great team accommodation locally, so there is no need to spend all of your hard earned money on rents and bills!

Working alongside the Head chef you will be responsible for the production of all the food in the catering on site, plus extra seasonal and events pop ups. You will be helping with menu development, leading and training the other kitchen team members. You will also be mostly actively preparing and cooking in the kitchen.

You will deliver the catering for meetings, private functions and weddings, and large scale events – including Krankenhaus Music Festival and Muncaster’s famous Halloween event. This will be alongside the day to day operations of the catering offerings that continue during these events.
We offer a fantastic work life balance with this role. The majority of our visitor offer is in daytime hours, with only events, festivals and guest experiences in the evenings, so this role also offer a fantastic lifestyle choice compared to most hotels and restaurants or any city based café.
This is initially a seasonal fixed term role, but we will be reviewing that before October, considering demand and opening times.

If you are passionate about delivering great food in a fast paced environment, and excited by the idea of working in a unique, inspiring and forward thinking business then we would love to hear from you.

To be suitable for this role you will need to demonstrate a successful track record of working in a kitchen team in a similar environment, and have all the knowledge and skills to help supervise and work in a busy kitchen. You will need loads of enthusiasm and energy and have the ambition and skills to develop a reputation for an excellent and consistent food offer at Muncaster..

Muncaster is literally a family business and home, and we pride ourselves on including all of our team as part of our wider Muncaster family – we hope you will want to join us for what could be, as Peter Pan would say, “an awfully big adventure”.

Contact Ewan Frost-Pennington if you wish to have an informal discussion about the position on: recruitment@muncastercastle.co.uk

For further information about the role, click on the View Role Profile button below.

You will need to send us an up-to-date CV and a short covering letter (max 2 sides A4) to recruitment@muncastercastle.co.uk explaining how you meet the criteria on the Role Profile and specifically why you want this particular job and to work at Muncaster Castle and Gardens.

View Role Profile

Muncaster Castle Café Assistant