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Terrene Huang’s journey from industrial design to JWU Providence’s Culinary Science & Product Development program is connected to her love of science and creativity. Although she didn’t start baking seriously until the pandemic, she quickly realized that she wanted to pursue it professionally. When she began researching programs, JWU’s combination of baking fundamentals, scientific rigor and creative potential appealed to her.

Huang’s baking journey began with a gig at a small pastry shop (more on that below), but she ramped up her baking skills during her job at Facebook Meta’s third-party Seattle production facility, where the team made hundreds of pastries a day using set formulas and recipes.

“I love that baking is based in science,” she explained. Being creative within a rigid framework is equally important to her, which is one of the reasons she decided to transfer to JWU.

Terrene didn’t begin her career in high-volume baking production. She graduated in 2020 with a degree in industrial design from the University of Washington. “A great time to graduate! I don’t know if you remember, but something happened in the world.”

Despite the pandemic, she found a job designing dog beds and toys for a company in Bellingham, Washington. She loved the job, but things started to change when the company went through a merger. “I was searching for something new anyway, and I thought, maybe it’s a transition time for me.”

That’s when she discovered baking.

Terrene shared her JWU journey with us, including how she made the leap from CAD to JWU’s kitchens. A quick note about the interview: I spoke to Terrene before she moved to the East Coast, which is why we are talking about her job at Meta in the present tense.

“I love pastry. I like that it’s based on science and that people have figured out the proper ratios, but if you want to change it up a little bit, that’s good too. It’s been a growth of different passions I’ve loved throughout my life.”

Before you got your gig at Meta, you worked at an independent cake shop. Tell me how that came about.

I was looking to make the move back to Seattle to look for new things in design. I was visiting to apartment hunt, and I went out for food with one of my friends. I was in line with her at this doughnut shop, and we were both like, “Oh my gosh, the doughnuts here are so great!” I said, “Wow, wouldn’t it be great to do this?” And she said, “I actually just left this bakery gig.” I said, “Tell me more!” [laughs]

I landed a job at a little cake shop around here and I still love them very much. But it was hard to work there and support myself at the same time. I had to transition to something a little bit bigger, which I’m doing now. I work as a vendor under Facebook Meta at one of their cafes in Bellevue, Washington — our team makes the pastry in house. They provide all the meals for their employees, and pastry is one of the teams that they have.

What’s your favorite thing to make?

Breads would be my favorite things to make. I love working with dough shaping and forming dough — it’s really fun. I also really love making panna cottas. [In the meta kitchen], we’re dunking gallons and gallons of milk and cream everywhere, but oh my gosh, they taste so good. And I love savory things — anything cheesy, I’m on it!

Jumping from industrial design to baking & pastry arts is a big change. Tell us how your interests evolved.

I didn’t start baking until the pandemic. I grew up in Sacramento, California, and I’ve always loved food. My mom is an incredible cook and we grew up on her incredible Taiwanese and Chinese dishes.

“Going back to school is one of those things where you have a community almost built in for you. You get to meet new people from different backgrounds and different perspectives.”

I never really knew that culinary was an option for a career. I just figured it’s a good thing to love good food because it brings people together. And I really love design, but I wanted to bring my passion for food into it.

I thought, “What else can I do in this field?” That’s where I started researching culinary science and understanding there’s this whole field of research and development; I can combine it with my background in product development, in design, in understanding user research and user bases, user needs, with my culinary passion and love for food.

I love pastry. I like that it’s based on science and that people have figured out the proper ratios, but if you want to change it up a little bit, that’s good too. It’s just been a growth of different passions I’ve loved throughout my life that have come together nicely.

How did you find out about JWU? What appealed to you about Culinary Science & Product Development?

I was doing research into what other directions that food could take me and I fell into the product development category. I looked up what I needed to study to do that, and I found a lot of food science [programs], and then culinary science and culinary arts. Then I thought, “What’s the difference between all of these? I’m hearing a lot of the same words here.”

I discovered that the culinary science program balances that science aspect with understanding the reason why we add certain ingredients or use certain ratios. And it’s also more focused on the development process. What I really wanted was a foundation in both the food science side and the culinary arts side, and JWU offered that with the product development major with a focus on baking and pastry.

Tell us about your first impression of the Providence Campus.

I visited Rhode Island last month. I did a tour of campus and looked around at apartments. And I checked out the food in the area — a coworker of mine named Katie Sullivan, who went to JWU, sent me a list of like places that her and her boyfriend love to eat at.

But the thing that struck me the most was seeing the labs and the different facilities. It was neat to see that there are all these dedicated spaces where students can learn about what they were working on, like the chocolate lab. And the dry storage was so well organized.

We saw a lot of student projects in the hallways, like cakes, sugar and chocolate work. It was cool to see and think, “This is what I’m going to be learning to make,” and wondering, “How will I do this? What kind of prompts do they get?” And maybe I can practice at home first so that my first project doesn’t turn out badly! [laughs]

What are you most looking forward to in the fall?

I think going back to school is one of those things where you have a community almost built in for you. And [you get to] meet new people from different backgrounds and different perspectives. And learning everyone’s views on food — everyone has grown up, I think, with a different story on food. Food always brought my friends together, and I think it’s something that naturally brings together people very easily.

I’m also excited to explore the food scene around campus, knowing that you’re surrounded by such talented individuals and that they go on to work in the area.

Tell us about your dream job. (Obviously, subject to change!)

I don’t have a specific company, but I definitely want to do case studies and help bakeries or different restaurants do menu development and prepare recipes for a company or for production in different areas. In another direction, it would be really neat to address food insecurity and try to find more sustainable ways to produce food. Reducing food waste would also be good for my soul.

Bonus question: Introduce us to your pup!

His name’s Earl Grey, and his favorite foods to test are bread and whipped cream! I try to limit what sorts of goodies he eats, and he’s also quite good at self-control and only taking whatever I give him.

Extra bonus question: Now that classes have started, do you have a favorite so far?

I’ve honestly loved learning in my Intro to Food Product Development class — Professor [Lynn] Tripp is so knowledgeable and passionate. One day after we talked a lot about food labels and marketing on packaging, my friend and I took a trip to Costco and were pointing out all the ingredients and labels we recognized. My favorite place on campus so far is Thursdays in the CCCE when the bake sale is happening!

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