Podcast Episode 124

From Army to Artistry: Trenin Nubiru’s Culinary Reinvention

Trenin Nubiru | 56 Minutes | January 28, 2025

In today’s episode, we chat with Trenin Nubiru, a graduate of Escoffier’s culinary and baking & pastry programs.

Trenin’s journey to the kitchen is far from conventional. With an engineering degree from West Point and 20 years of military service as a captain in communications, he made a bold leap into the culinary world. After discovering a deep passion for cooking and pastry, he enrolled at Escoffier, where he honed his skills in patisserie, cake design, and chocolate work. Today, Trenin competes on prestigious stages and prepares for the prestigious Coupe du Monde de la Pâtisserie and Bocuse d’Or.

Join us as we dive into Trenin’s remarkable transition from the Army Band to the world of American cuisine, his commitment to excellence, and the power of self-discovery.

Watch the podcast episode:

Kirk Bachmann and Trenin Nubiru
Notes & Transcript

TRANSCRIPT

Kirk Bachmann: Hello, everyone, my name is Kirk Bachmann, and welcome back to The Ultimate Dish. Today, we are thrilled – I am thrilled! – to welcome Trenin Nubiru—a graduate of Escoffier’s Culinary AND Baking & Pastry Programs and a shining example of how passion can lead to extraordinary reinvention.

After beginning his journey as a saxophone player in the Army band, earning an Electrical Engineering degree from West Point, and serving as Captain in Communications, Trenin spent 20 years in military service before discovering a new passion: the world of cooking, baking, and pastry arts.

At Escoffier, he fully embraced the creativity of cuisine as well as the intricate science and artistry of baking, honing techniques ranging from all things cooking to patisserie and cake design.

His journey also included an impactful externship in chocolate work where he refined his technical skills under the mentorship of a fellow veteran.

But Trenin’s ambitions extend well beyond the classroom. From mentoring aspiring bakers in competitions to preparing for the prestigious Coupe du Monde de la Pâtisserie and Bocuse d’Or, he’s been able to channel his military discipline into a bright and innovative culinary future.

So get ready for an inspiring conversation about ambition, artistry, American Cuisine, and the transformative power of stepping boldly into the unknown.

And there he is. How are you, buddy?!

Trenin Nubiru: I’m phenomenal. Thank you so much for that introduction.

Kirk Bachmann: How about that? Can I catch my breath for a second?

Trenin Nubiru: I’m catching my breath still.

Trenin’s “Satellite Kitchen” and Social Media

Kirk Bachmann: My goodness. I love this. People are going to figure out really quickly that you and I have met. I could not be more proud, first of all, having known you, now, for the last few years, but I couldn’t be more proud to have you on the show. I threatened this for a long time. Here we are. Here we are. Let’s go.

What’s going on? Set the stage a little bit. I’m looking at a lot of stuff here. You’ve got a sax over there. Didn’t know about that. Got your apron hanging over there. What’s going on?

Trenin Nubiru: Yeah. This is my normal set up, actually. I have my saxophone. I have an alto right here. There’s a soprano behind it that is still in the case right now. Then, I have a whole piano and music setup off-camera that you can’t see where I do a lot of composition and also practicing. I’m with the JeffCo Community Band. I practice a lot of the marches, a few other pieces here and there. It’s pretty fun.

Then, I have my speed rack in the back with all my cooking equipment on it. I actually have at least one of every single piece of equipment that’s at Escoffier. I have my RoboCool, got my Vitamix. I even have a juicer over here. I have a meat slicer down there. I have every single color of tape board that’s there. All the different types of rolling pins.

Kirk Bachmann: It’s our satellite kitchen! It’s Trenin’s satellite kitchen. If you’re missing anything, you let me know, and I’ll get it over there for sure. I feel like I’ve been in your kitchen because you’re posting – this isn’t on the script, but I’m curious. It just popped up. You’re posting a lot more on social media of late. Is there something I don’t know about? Are you looking to start a little company with social media?

Trenin Nubiru: Not looking to start a social media company as much as I’m looking to deliver an experience. I really like teaching, almost, but really showing people what I’m working on and the things that I’m doing. It helps spin my creativity because a lot of the people that follow me – friends, family, and stuff – they’re like, “Hey, Trenin, I really like this. Have you tried doing that?” They’ll give me really good feedback, and I love it. I’ll take notes on the feedback, and then the next video that comes out will be something related to that.

It’s pretty interesting. I’ve thought about tagging all the people who inspire me to make these dishes because it’s not random. It’s very thought out. It’s requested. It’s back-and-forth dialogue. “Try this, and then show it to me.” I usually end up posting stuff on the social media because I have a world-wide network. I can’t talk to my friends in Korea and my friends in Europe and show them the stuff I’m doing. I just post it on social media, and they’re able to catch it.

Kirk Bachmann: Isn’t that something? Even for an old guy like me, social media has become [important]. In my house from my older daughters, I’ve just got boxes and boxes of photos, old school stuff, before social media. Now, you never even think about [them]. I was looking at my Canon camera the other day sitting in the closet. “Wow! I haven’t touched that thing in like ten years.” Because social media is just such a great, great closet for photos and sharing things. I don’t ever post anything controversial or political. It’s just about family. It’s about cooking. It’s about cool things.

One thing I was going to ask you is that, when I look at your cooking and you walk people through in a very nice way – and I know that you live there alone – you cook a lot of food! Do you invite friends over, or do you take it over to people’s homes?

Trenin Nubiru: It depends. There is a method to it as well. A lot of the desserts I do distribute. I take it down to the front desk at my apartment complex. They love me here.

Kirk Bachmann: I bet. I bet.

Trenin Nubiru: I’m always bringing something. Holidays coming up. We have an event coming. I’ll do that. I’ve got some close friends that are local that I’ll share dishes with sometimes, too, as well.

I’ve really focused in on making smaller portions of things. I’m cooking a lot. I’m cooking frequently, but I’m not cooking more than two/three servings of a product at a time. That turns into my meal. It turns into how I supplement myself throughout the day. I also take the learning approach to trying new techniques.

Moving and the Military

Kirk Bachmann: You’re still slim. I see you frequently enough to know you’re not putting on the pounds.

Let’s dive in. We’re going to come back and forth. I have more questions that I’ve even planned for. I’ve spent the last several years really getting to know you. I want to set the stage for our listeners. The listeners will be beyond just our students. We’re really developing a crowd here as influencers. People are happy to listen to the Ultimate Dish.

I think what’s really, really interesting – to use a pun – is to peel back the layers. Let’s peel the onion back a little bit because your story is riveting. It’s fun. It’s thoughtful. If you’re cool with it, let’s go all the way back to childhood and talk a little bit about the military. Were there other members of your family that were in the military? How did you get inspired to do that? And thank you for that, by the way.

At the same time, what were your early fascinations with cuisine, with food? Did your family cook at home a lot? Let’s start there and then we’ll jump into the Army band in just a minute.

Trenin Nubiru: Understood. Okay. I’m going to start at the very beginning; I’m going to start at birth back in the mid-80s. Trenin was born in Tulsa, Oklahoma, and from that point, life just exploded into exploration. That’s what I’ve termed it at this point. I moved so much. I lived in Oklahoma, Oklahoma City, Sepulpa, Oklahoma, Tulsa. I moved up to Michigan for a while, lived in Inkster in Detroit off of the west side of Seven Mile, moved down to Alabama, stayed in a place called East Lake. It’s a sub-set of Birmingham. Tons of moving. I feel like I went to a different school every year until high school. Then, when I got to high school, I was able to stay there from nine to twelve.

Childhood, I grew up all over the place. That’s a big thing for me; when people ask where I’m from, I come back with the word, “Earth?”

Kirk Bachmann: Are you a military brat? Is that why?

Trenin Nubiru: About that – not necessarily a military brat. I’m not sure exactly why we moved so much. My mother was in the Army Reserves for a little while. She retired at the Army Reserves. I remember, when I was younger, she got deployed to Desert Storm/Desert Shield, and I stayed with my grandmother for a little while. That’s really the only influence that the military had on my life, that small little section where she was gone, deployed, then came back. After that, she was Mom. She was at home the entire time I grew up.

She was in Reserves, so she did her weekend drills once a month, I think. Every year they’d have two weeks, but I wasn’t really affected by the military lifestyle, traditionally. We just moved a lot.

Grandma’s Cooking Influence

Kirk Bachmann: What about the cooking piece of that? Was that Grandma-influenced, Mom-influenced?

Trenin Nubiru: I’m going to say Grandma had more to do with that. Grandma was a phenomenal cook, and Grandma probably spoiled me when it came to food. It was like, “Trenin, Darell what do you want?” (She called me Trenin Darell my first and middle.) “Trenin Darell, what do you want?”

I loved her banana puddings. I was like, “Banana pudding.” All the time.

Kirk Bachmann: I love banana pudding. Who doesn’t love banana pudding?

Trenin Nubiru: My grandmother made a phenomenal banana pudding. That was one of my favorite meals aside from just [her] cooking every meal. Breakfast was done. Always had lunch there. Dinner, she made sure I ate. I used to watch her around the kitchen. I shadowed her a bit. I grew up in a very country, rural-type environment. Farm land. I did a lot of foraging growing up. Horses. Tons of fishing and hunting. Being a four-year-old with a shotgun and my grandpa in the background shouting, “Yeah, shoot it! Shoot it!” I think I just dislocated my shoulder.

Kirk Bachmann: So that was Alabama?

Trenin Nubiru: That was in Oklahoma.

Heading to the Military

Kirk Bachmann: That was in Oklahoma. Okay, got it. Wow. Then did you become interested in the military when you were in high school, kind of stationary for four years?

Trenin Nubiru: That is what happened. By the time I got to high school, I had already established a lot of who I am, my behaviors, my traits, my interests, my hobbies, everything. The wheels had already been turning on what I wanted to do with my life. Day One, through the door, freshman in high school Trenin knew what he was going to do. I didn’t need to think about it. There was no extra stuff involved. There was no, “I don’t know where this income is going to come from.” I already knew. I was like, on graduation, I’m out of here. I’m heading to the military.

Kirk Bachmann: And who influenced that, Trenin, at such an early age.

Trenin Nubiru: Honestly, I think my JROTC instructors influenced it more than anything. My mother was reserve military. She definitely provided me with a good foundation, a structure, organizations, cleanliness, chores. Get this done. Put yourself on a cycle. Regulate yourself. She definitely provided that structure to me.

But my personal interests are with the hunting and the fitness. I played almost every sport growing up. I had to have played every sport.

Kirk Bachmann: I was just going to ask. I was just going to ask.

Trenin Nubiru: I played hockey, football, basketball, track.

Kirk Bachmann: I’ve seen you on the skates on social media.

Trenin Nubiru: I was in Philadelphia; that was fun. That was fun. I [was] just playing the sports, keeping myself fit.

I’ve mentioned this before that I was a tinkerer growing up. Love to tinker with things. I would disassemble anything I could find to figure out how it worked and then put it back together. I was doing this with an old screwdriver, an old wrench, anything I could get my hands on because I didn’t have a set, structured toolbox. I was huge on taking stuff apart, putting it together. I love working with my hands. I love being in that environment with other people.

Like I said, once I got to high school and joined JROTC, my instructors were going back and forth with me. “Man, you are really good at a lot of this stuff, and you have a military background, or at least the discipline. What about a career in the army?”

I’m like, “I’m already ahead of you. I’ve already thought about it.”

A Musical Family

Kirk Bachmann: Isn’t that something? Where does music come in? Was music part of Grandma, Mom, or is that just Trenin?

Trenin Nubiru: Music is a family thing. I don’t even know where it originated. I remember playing my grandmother’s piano in her house as a kid growing up. I remember my mother plays. She plays the flute; she was in band. My sisters play. My family members that don’t play musical instruments, they’re all vocalists. They sing. They are phenomenal vocalists. They own record labels and stuff.

Kirk Bachmann: When you talk to chefs and people in the industry, there’s this theme that I’ve brought up – not every single episode, but quite a bit. It’s fast cars; it’s motorcycles; it’s music, or it’s all of the above. Music is obviously a big part of your life. How does this all migrate into – I’m putting the pictures together. You joined the army right out of high school.

Trenin Nubiru: Actually, still in high school. I did my audition for the military band between my junior and senior year. I ended up enlisted on September 12 of 2002, a year after the Twin Towers.

Kirk Bachmann: Then you were in the band in the army the entire twenty years you were there.

Trenin Nubiru: Yes.

Kirk Bachmann: Tell me about that. Obviously, music is still a big part of your life, but I just want to hear about all the things that you’re doing. Because you didn’t do any cooking in the army, though, right?

Trenin Nubiru: No.

Kirk Bachmann: That came after. Walk me through. I guess I have never thought about music [as being part of the military]. Maybe when I watch West Point play Army, or Navy play Army on television. “Hey, they’ve got a band!” and all that. Tell me about music and the army.

Trenin Nubiru: Very professional. That audition to the Army Band was by far the most complicated audition I’ve ever in my life had. I played every scale that I know: major, minor, harmonic, melodic, pentatonic, just up and down all the scales. Then, as I’m going through these scales, I’ve got three judges in front of me, and they’re taking notes. Not only are they taking notes, but they’re writing music while I’m playing.

Then, they were like, “Alright. Play this piece.” I would go to my prepared piece, and I’ll get through that, and then one of the military guys will take the music he was writing during my audition and put it in front of me and be like, “Go. You’ve got to sightread this now.”

It was just like reacting. Reacting. It was very good; I enjoyed it, but that was intense.

Kirk Bachmann: That almost feels, to associate that with cooking and baking, it almost feels like a mystery basket.

Trenin Nubiru: Exactly.

Kirk Bachmann: You’ve got all these techniques. Here’s these ingredients. Go.

Speaking of “go,” I’m going to catch you off guard with the whole musician piece. I love this question, and it’s not on the script. But, if you had to list your top three bands of all time – think “High Fidelity” – Go. What are those three bands?

Trenin Nubiru: I’m a marching band person.

Kirk Bachmann: Okay. We’ve never had that answer before.

Trenin Nubiru: My top three right now, Jackson State University out of Mississippi is number one.

Kirk Bachmann: Wow! Okay.

Trenin Nubiru: Hands down. Deion Sanders used to coach there. Their music program, phenomenal.

Kirk Bachmann: Top notch.

Trenin Nubiru: Top notch. I’m talking creativity, artistry, musicianships dynamics. They play music, very soulful music. It sounds great. Hands down number one band.

Number two would be Southern University out of Louisiana. Then, number three would be Texas Southern out of – I don’t know. I think they are in the Dallas area or something. I’m not sure exactly where they are located.

Kirk Bachmann: University of Michigan doesn’t make the podium? Wow!

Trenin Nubiru: Naw. They’re not my style. I’m more of a show style as opposed to the core style of marching.

The End Was the Goal

Kirk Bachmann: I got a great answer. We have never had that answer before. Absolutely love it.

My son is a freshman at Centaurus High School, which is not far from the school. He plays baseball. The band there – I had no idea – has won the state competition. They’re 5A, I think. Year after year after year. It’s really cool to see that. They take it so seriously. It’s spectacular. Absolutely spectacular. I’ll take you there one time. I think you’d enjoy it.

Trenin, if you had to reflect on your twenty years in the military. You and I have talked about this in the past, so I’m not going to ask you too many details, but is there something that you’re most proud of in your time there? That you can share.

Trenin Nubiru: Yes. This is funny. The thing I am most proud of is retirement. That is a goal.

Kirk Bachmann: Twenty years.

Trenin Nubiru: If I could show you the statistics on how many people actually make it that far and they’re able to retire and live life! The attrition rate is so high. Miles high. When I first went in – actually, when I switched out from West Point and I started down my officer career path, they used to preach to us [that] a successful military career would be making the rank of Lieutenant Colonel and commanding a battalion.

I didn’t make it that far, but I still consider myself completely successful because I made it to retirement. One hundred percent.

Kirk Bachmann: That’s such a great answer. And you retired as a captain, right?

Trenin Nubiru: Yes.

The Journey of Self-Discovery

Kirk Bachmann: Yeah. Congratulations, buddy. Absolutely spectacular.

I’m going to change this question up a little bit. I think you’ve already addressed it. I was going to ask you if you had a need for a career change, and you joined the military, but it sounds like this was something in your heart and your soul at a very young age. You pursued it, and you got to retirement type-of-thing.

If you were in front of students – and I want to say for the audience, by the way, that Trenin spoke at graduation on the campus of CU two years ago. Over two-thousand people in the audience. Probably one of the most memorable speeches because it came from the heart. You sweat profusely up there. You were like a coach on the field just talking to these graduates like you loved and knew every single one of them. We still talk about it. You may have dropped a couple of bombs, but that’s okay. It was all part of the speech. But if you had a big group of students or potential students in front of you and you were giving them advice on changing their career trajectory, changing their [lives], what advice would you give them?

Trenin Nubiru: I would give them the advice that I applied to myself. The self-discovery part is a huge portion in any type of career, initiating or changing. You have to know who you are. I had the advantage growing up. I will say this: I had complete freedom growing up. I was encouraged to pave my own way. I cannot recall any situation where anybody ever told me, “No.” Everything I wanted to do, I got to do. It didn’t matter how crazy. I got a lot of weird looks. “Trenin, what are you over there doing?” “Ah, I’m just doing this.” But after I articulated myself and explained what I was doing, it was like, “Man, this little kid really knows what he’s doing. He’s not just messing around with stuff.”

But that self-exploration, I had to do it again after retiring. I sat around for almost a year-and-a-half trying to figure out who I was, what I’m supposed to do with all these new skills I have and how to repackage it. How they are transferable between different industries. Definitely self-exploration.

That was a huge thing with a lot of my younger classmates when I was going through the program and also people I’ve worked with in the industry. I’d get in the back, in the kitchen with these younger guys. I don’t talk to them about food; I talk to them about who they are. Who are you as a person? Who are you trying to be? What do you want to do? What are your aspirations? What are you going for? What are your talents? I get a lot of blank stares. I get a lot of, “Uh! I’ve never thought about that before. I’m glad you asked that question. Can I do that?” That’s a huge one.

“Can I do that?” It’s like asking for permission to be yourself. Don’t do that. You are yourself. Just go explore. Be yourself. Pick up something; put it down. If you don’t like it, try something else. If you do, then go. Don’t make unsuccess a bad thing. Failure is to be expected. We all get knocked down. We come back up. Get used to the feeling. Don’t make it a bad thing. Understand its purpose, and evolve around it. I was doing something that needed to change. That’s all that happened. I changed it, and now everything is working out fine.

I would encourage a lot of self-discovery if I was talking to the younger people. Making sure they have some type of identity. They know who they are, especially coming out of high school. Know who you are, what you want to do. Start thinking about it now.

The Whimsy Cookie Company

Kirk Bachmann: Such a great answer. It’s not easy to do. It’s hard to look in the mirror. It’s hard to look in the mirror. It’s a cliché, but Michael Jordan used to always comment on how many shots he missed. How many shots he missed. Tom Brady talks more about the losses and how he learned from those losses versus the victories, the most successful quarterback in the history of the NFL. Really, really, really good advice.

Through our research – I have to admit, I didn’t know anything about this. I’m just going to ask it. The Whimsy Cookie Company in Georgia. How do I not know this story? Fill me in on this.

Trenin Nubiru: Okay. I moved to Atlanta on a whim.

Kirk Bachmann: That’s where you moved to Boulder from, if I remember.

Trenin Nubiru: Yes, I moved to Boulder-

Kirk Bachmann: From Atlanta, right? I remember that.

Trenin Nubiru: I was enjoying life in Florida. I was coming off of just winning my first bodybuilding competition. I was excited.

Kirk Bachmann: That’s another one I didn’t know. What is going on here? Okay.

Trenin Nubiru: I won the Men’s Physique category.

Kirk Bachmann: Oh my God! Alright.

Trenin Nubiru: I don’t know why, but I think it was just the environment. I was surrounded by a bunch of retirees. I was surrounded by a bunch of folks that were almost three times my age. “Ah, do I really want to be surrounded by this? I’m still young. I want to get back into doing things.” I had to get my mental back together because my mental health – it collapsed on me towards the end of my career.

I actually did not self-select myself out of the military. I got a medical discharge for mental health reasons. I had to do a lot of recovering from that. Then I was like, “Alright. I feel like I’m more stable. Let me get back. I want to do more.”

And I ended up in Atlanta, of all places. I did not want to go to Atlanta, Chef. That was not where I wanted. I was like, “I don’t want to be there.” I didn’t like the energy there. I thought the place was more like crabs in a bucket – a lot of people fighting for minimal resources. I just had this crazy assumption about Atlanta in my head, and everything about me didn’t want to go there. But that’s somehow where I ended up.

I moved to Atlanta, and I was walking the neighborhood where I moved. There was a cookie store that was right on the other side of the railroad tracks. It was like a five-minute walk. I was walking in there every single day. They had a “Help Wanted” sign, so I walked in. Iris was the owner. Iris, she’s an elderly lady. I think she was in her late eighties, maybe, early-to-late eighties. This older lady. She walked in.

“What type of help are you looking for?” I could see.

She was like, “I need people to lift heavy things for me and move fifty-pound bags of sugar.” I’m looking at her like, yeah, that makes sense.

I’m like, “I can do that.”

And then it was like, “Also, the baker is transitioning out of the job. We need help with the baking process, too.”

I told her, “These are my credentials.” I showed her my resume, which was still heavily military at the time.

She was like, “Trenin, I can’t afford you. Your skill set.”

I was like, “No, please.” I kind of pleaded a little bit. “Please don’t do this to me. I’m trying to start over. I’m willing to grind. Put me at the bottom. Ignore the fact that I was just in charge of five-thousand people. I’m starting completely over.”

She was like, “Alright. I’m going to bring you on.” So she brought me on.

The original baker that was there, she showed me some basic things to do with the cooking and stuff, but Kendra, the manager, she was the bigger influence. Nothing but love and respect from her. She actually graduated from Le Cordon Bleu. She took me under her wing. She taught me how to make so many different types of cookies.

After I got proficient with just the baking of the cookies and stuff, she asked me one day, “Trenin, you want to do something extra.”

I said, “Like what?”

She was like, “Can you decorate this? This is a rosette.” She piped it! “This is a rosette. This is a leaf tip.” She showed me all the tips, and then told me to go watch YouTube videos. Which is what I did. I went home. I probably watched YouTube piping videos that entire night. I went to sleep, woke up, and was still watching them.

Then I went in, and I showed her that I could do it, just the natural artisticness in me. I showed her I could decorate it.

She was like, “Good!”

Then as we progressed, the decorations just dialed in. It all got really good. She started making me do the custom orders. We had a birthday coming up. “Can you make this cake?” I was like, “Yes!” So I did little Yoda cookies. Lots of unicorns. I don’t know why unicorns were so popular. Unicorns. Cats. Drawing all these different things in the buttercream icings on the top of the cookies and decorating them. And it was good! And I learned so much about myself.

She helped me really leave my military structure energy behind and helped me understand my emotions, what was going on inside of me. I had no idea. I would talk. I remember: I broke down crying to her because I had no idea what was going on with me. I want to say it was the first time I really felt loved by somebody. I’m very appreciative of her. She helped me understand what was going on in me. Then she encouraged me to go forward.

She’s the reason I came to Escoffier. She advocated for Le Cordon Bleu because she was a graduate from there. She completely advocated for it, however, it was at Covid time, and Cordon Bleu completely shut down in the U.S. And there wasn’t no leaving. It was like, Go to Escoffier. They’ve got two programs over here, one in Texas, one in Boulder. I was like, “You know what? I’m going to go out to Colorado.” I didn’t want to go to Texas.

A Need to Understand

Kirk Bachmann: I’ve got to send Kendra a thank you note. I love the transparency. I love the emotion. You’re looking in the mirror, man. You’re looking in the mirror. I love that story. I love that story.

Let’s talk a little bit more about Escoffier. By now, our listeners know that Trenin very well may be – I’ve been doing this for over thirty years and trying to impact people in the way that I think Escoffier impacted you. It’s a small podium when you think about the podium when you think about the people that really, really impacted my life. You’re at the top of that podium, buddy. I’m so proud of you and so happy that we have a chance to stay in touch and a chance to memorialize our history right here on the screen.

You enrolled in culinary school. You came to Escoffier, came to Boulder. I remember the day I met you. You were born to give that speech at graduation, by the way. Tell us a little bit about your experience in school. You were unique. You volunteered for everything. I think you motivated a lot of other people. You reminded me a lot of myself after I went to college. I went to culinary school at my dad’s beckoning. I probably learned more, Trenin, by the volunteering that I did, the competitions that I did, the stuff that you couldn’t put a dollar amount on. My hand was always raised, and I immersed myself. I poured myself into it, like you did, every single day. Even after graduation! Kristen Kish comes to town. I’m like, “Trenin, you’ve got to come over to the campus. Kristen’s here.” Absolutely love that.

You’ve said this on a blog for us. As you think about what you think about what your experience was, I want people to realize…and you did two programs so far. It takes a massive amount of precision and technique to thrive, not only in culinary, but in baking and pastry. Maybe even more so in baking and pastry. You were able to maybe use your engineering mindset or your military discipline to your advantage. You said in one of our blog articles, and I quote: “Listen. I’ve always been a tinkerer.” You said that earlier. “If I want to take a random ingredient and make it into a tart, I need to know how much water content that ingredient has, how it coagulates, how it emulsifies with other ingredients, and then how I can manipulate it.” That is incredibly profound and astute. It’s critical thinking. That’s all we can ever ask is that we show folks how to cook, how to cook, what to cook, when to cook, but the critical thinking comes from you. Can you talk a little bit about your experience from a student’s perspective?

Trenin Nubiru: Definitely. My intention when I started there, I put a lot of things in perspective. One, I already have a ton of military experience behind me. I’m a little bit more – I don’t want to say older – a little more mature in my career and what I want to do with my life. I’m putting things in perspective. I really want to hit this industry running. That’s what I told myself. I don’t feel the need to go through basic training again. I don’t feel the need to start all the way from the bottom. I don’t feel the need to work my way up through things.

But in order for me to start at the level I wanted to start at, I knew I had a knowledge gap that I needed to fill in. I told myself, Day One, “I’m coming here. I’m open-minded. I want to learn absolutely everything.” And this is where the engineering thing comes from, too. A big thing that I noticed about getting my degree in electrical engineering is the engineers. They understand the basics. Engineers understand the basics, and with the understanding of the basics, they’re capable of modifying things. They’re capable of advancing things that exist. They’re capable of recreating things and also building things from scratch. But it’s a huge foundation of the basics that you have to understand in order to do that.

I saw another interview. You were talking about the differences between cooking here in Boulder versus cooking at zero degree feet level.

Kirk Bachmann: Altitude. Yeah.

Trenin Nubiru: I need to understand everything. I don’t want to be a great cook in Boulder but then go visit my family in Alabama at 200 feet above sea level, and I can’t successfully bake a cake. It’s a lot of needing to know everything. But I didn’t know the depth that I needed to know it until Chef Dan.

My favorite chef in the world! I told him. We had a heart-to-heart conversation. I said, “I’m not like other students. I can take it. Drill it into me. If I’m doing something wrong, correct me. If there’s something else I can learn, give it to me. If you’ve got extra resources…” To this day, he just sent me another cookbook the other week. Phenomenal. He is the reason that I started thinking about food the way I think about it. I started picking it up and playing with it and manipulating it. “What else can this egg do? What else can this flour do? This whole line of hydrocolloidials.” Chef Nalls taught me about those, actually. It was like, What are these things? How do they work? At what temperatures do they work? Why do they work at that temperature?

I messed up so much stuff. That helped, too. “Man, how did I just mess this up?” Then, you go back and look at the science behind it. Oh! It’s because you reduced the water content below sixty-seven percent which completely changed the structure on how this item baked according to this cooking method. You use a dry heat cooking method, and you were below a certain hydration level. Now, you’re getting a completely different product, but at that hydration level, if I would have, say, sous vide the product, it would have come out perfect. It’s switching all that stuff up.

Not only understanding what goes into the food and makes the food the food, but then if you take something out and you switch it around, what else do I have to change to reproduce this product? Then it came down to cooking methods and stuff like that.

Kirk Bachmann: So well said. To use your example of engineering, [electrical] engineering, you’ve got your electricity and circuits down here at Escoffier. You needed to understand high altitude rations. From the basics, right? Food safety is number one. It’s the first thing you have to get wrapped around your head, which you may not have to worry about as an engineer.

Trenin Nubiru: Completely different ball game.

The Challenge of Chocolate

Kirk Bachmann: Chef Dan is going to love this episode. He’s right around the corner in K-4 there.

You know what I love, Trenin, hearing you? It seems like the curiosity is still there. Curiosity helped you grow serving our country, helped you grow as a cookie maker, helped you grow, probably, as an engineer, but also definitely helped you grow as a cook, as a chef. Being vulnerable is super, super important. Always take pride in that.

You eventually went to an externship at Lift Chocolate, which sort of surprised me, but then it didn’t surprise me. Very unique. Very intricate. Very stylish. Very sexy, actually. Learning to work with chocolate. Why did you select that route? Your externship specifically. I remember talking to you on the phone your last day of externship because I needed you here on the campus for something – I can’t remember what – but how did that prepare you? I want to go back to life. I want to go back to the mirror. You finished one program. You came back and did another program. How did that externship at a very unique place prepare you for where you’re sitting here today?

Trenin Nubiru: Fun story. Brandon, the owner over there, I loved him. Marine. He’s still in the marines right now. I think he’s a lieutenant colonel, too, in the marines, too. Very high-ranking individual. Wonderful to work with. That staff was amazing. Very small staff, very family-oriented. I want to say it might have been six of us in there on any given day, which really helped facilitate the learning process. The smaller group of people was more intimate. You can ask the questions, and everybody’s working together with this project to get it down.

The thing that I love most about them, because we had that really good military connection, it was always like, “Hey Trenin, I trust you. You’re a West Point grad. I feel like you know what you need or you want to know it. So talk to me. Help me out. How can I make this program beneficial to you.” We had that dialogue constantly. I don’t know too many people that go into a job and just start dialoguing with the boss right off the bat. “This is what I’ve got to offer. This is what I need help with. Can you help me?” But we had that open dialogue.

Once again, Chef Dan got me hyped about it. Working with chocolate. Oh my goodness! We did it a little bit in the program, but to that extent? Especially with what they were doing with the wholesale, making fourteen-thousand of a product, that repetition really helped me hone in a lot of my skills. Then, learning to work with chocolate under the different temperature conditions. On any given day, it would be too hot or too cold in the kitchen, or something would set too fast because the air conditioning vent is blowing air on the table and you don’t even realize it. That little extra impact from the air has now caused this product to speed up in its setting a lot faster. Ah, how do I adjust to that? Coloring chocolate was a new thing for me. That was fun, learning how to airbrush and spray paint and keeping things at the right temperatures and textures and making sure you stay in the sweet zone you have to stay in when working with chocolate.

Be a Self-Educator

Kirk Bachmann: With all of that said, again, such great comments. Any thoughts – I won’t hold you to them – again, if you’re in front of all those students. The word I’m looking for is maybe maximizing. What’s the advice to someone just starting, maybe without the military background, maybe a twenty-four year old? What is the advice to someone on how to maximize their experience – I was going to say Escoffier – but just their experience with education, period?

Trenin Nubiru: Maximize your experience with education. Be a self-educator. I think that’s the part that a lot of people are missing. They come in and they expect to be taught. That was not an expectation that I had. I’m confident with teaching myself, a hundred percent. I used the expertise at the school as, when I need help, it’s a reference. There’s a professional reference available for me. I know they have the answers, and I can demonstrate to them exactly what I’m doing, so they will quickly identify, “Oh! That’s what you’re doing wrong. It’s that step.”

I’m surprised you even know about it. It’s the self-study, self-taught, self-teach. I take that approach. It’s a lot of experimentation. We said earlier, you can’t make failure a bad thing. Don’t be afraid to fail, especially if you take the experimentation perspective of life. “I’m just going to try something out.” You go in, and “It’s ain’t going to work, but I’m not going to stop. I’m going to keep pushing it.” The education is just the self thing.

And even then, with the curriculum there. I know there are a ton more things that you guys wish that you could teach the students, but it is what’s the best cost? How is this going to benefit the industry? Stuff like that. You kind of pick and choose what you can focus on.

But as a student, you have to recognize. “Hey, I’m learning how to do this, but I know I’m not getting the full picture. What skill am I missing? What reinforcement do I need to look into and study so I can make this product better.”

Kirk Bachmann: I love that response. It gets me thinking. Your comment about how to learn in the classroom. We’re always trying to do better as well, reinvent ourselves, each individual chef. Chef Dan to all of our online instructors. Of late, we’ve been doing what we call “flipping the classroom.” In other words, providing some information out to our students in advance rather than lecturing at them, letting them review some of this information, and then when they come to class, we talk about it. Ask questions. I want to hear about your grandmother’s recipe. I want an international student to tell us a little bit about some ethnic cuisine that we may not be exploring in the classroom. It’s worked really, really well. What ends up happening is that our teachers have literally become facilitators of knowledge rather than talking at people. It’s been fabulous. The students react. They’re turning their cameras on more. “This is great! I want in this conversation.”

Trenin Nubiru: Chef Nalls is [phenomenal]. I’m going to credit Chef Nalls with the reason I approach food the way I do now.

Kirk Bachmann: Isn’t that something? Yeah.

Trenin Nubiru: It was through the door. He would consider you not prepared for class if you hadn’t done some type of research on what we’re doing and you can talk intelligently about it.

Kirk Bachmann: I love that.

Trenin Nubiru: That was the approach he took. “Alright. You’re not ready yet.” Being with him and having to research my food and where it’s coming from and its origins and the future of it and all of that stuff. It just, yes, it really helped me skyrocket. I love this new approach. A hundred percent.

What is American Cuisine?

Kirk Bachmann: I love it. I love it.

After you graduated, I noticed that you embraced this title of “food engineer.” I think there might be another product in there somewhere. In your free time, like we talked about before we got started today, you’re creating recipes. You’re refining recipes. You’re having fun with recipes. What excites you about that? And how would you define American cuisine today, as someone who is mature, been around the world, educated themselves at a high level in many different areas? How would you define American cuisine? By Trenin. American cuisine by Trenin.

Trenin Nubiru: The first question, real quick, before we get to American cuisine: it’s the process that really excites me the most. It is the process, the journey. I love being able to show something at the end and show you this really beautiful product that I came up with, but the process to get to that is what I love the most because that’s where I’m learning. It’s especially me doing stuff out of my kitchen and decreasing my portion sizes and making things smaller. It’s technique now. I need a new technique to be able to pipe something this small. I need a new type of mold, a new type of structure to be able to do this. I need to re-envision the way I’m combining these elements right now because I don’t have the facilities to support mass stuff.

That whole process is probably my favorite portion of it. Learning what’s next, what’s new. Every time I go in here to cook something, I learn something new. I learn a new way to do something. I wouldn’t say a better way, but a more efficient way. Efficiency: that’s one of my keywords. Really, the process is the driving motivator for me behind that.

Now, American cuisine. It occurred to me one day just randomly because I’ve traveled the world. I’ve been on five different continents, probably been in twelve, thirteen different countries. I think I’ve been to forty out of fifty states. I’ve been all over this world. I think when I originally started traveling, I would miss food from home. “Man, I miss me some American food.” But the word “American cuisine” is almost a joke in the food industry. I would go overseas and say, “I need something American.” The usual response was, “What, a hamburger?” They would saying laughing, joking. “Ha, ha, a hamburger. That’s American cuisine.” I understand where you’re coming from, but that’s not really American cuisine.

I wanted to define what American cuisine was. I had to do the history. “Why don’t we have this really definitive American cuisine?” I started looking at the places we draw from, like the French and Asia and stuff. I look at how long they’ve been established as a country. You’re talking dynasties. You’re talking B.C. on the timeline. They’ve been around for thousands of years. That’s how they developed this stuff. America had its 249th birthday this year. We’re 249 years old. We’re babies on the world front of things.

On top of that, our cuisine has evolved. It originally came over here, and we started off with basically some European influence a little bit. The Native American influence. Then, as we started moving west for expansion, building railroads, we brought the Asian influence into our cuisine. It broke down to what it currently is today. American food is every other cuisine of food. “Let me get some Italian food tonight. Let me get some Mexican food tonight.” Let me get some other food besides American food.

Then I started thinking, like we learned in school, what makes a food unique to its area? Most cuisines were developed based off of what was available to the people. This is what is available in this region of the world, so this is what we’re going to use to develop our food. And I’m looking at the timeline. It’s 2025 now. Logistics is nothing. What’s available is worldwide. I don’t have to get on the Golden Road and travel thousands of miles to trade spices anymore. I can go get spices right at the grocery stores. It’s taking a different approach. There is not an ingredient that is off-limits to me at this point. Everything is easily accessible or can be [gotten] with a little bit of effort. So that was the first portion, what was available to me.

The second portion – this was a realization portion for me. [I realized] I’m a subject matter expert on this. But not just me, but every single person who is alive right now who is cooking. Every single person who has been in America eating food is a subject matter expert on what American food is. I am open to listening to everybody because the thing is, I’m trying to unify American cuisine. Right now, we’ve got Southern cuisine. We’ve got some West Coast, Northwest cuisine, stuff from the south. There’s no real unification of it yet. It’s trying to spread. It’s definitely trying to spread, but there’s no unification of these different components of America. Having lived in almost every state in America, it’s like I know what is everywhere. I’ve tasted a lot of stuff. I can bring those elements together.

The third thing, the thing that really makes this American cuisine – I’m going to get into science with you – is the American diet. Food is fuel. Right? When I start thinking about the American diet – I’m into bodybuilding. That’s what I do, but I don’t want to just eat dry chicken breasts and brown rice. Now that I know how to cook, and I have my nutrition background. I know what a carb is. I know what a protein is. I know what a fat is. I understand the structure, the pyramids of balance, your macros and your micros and all the nutrients that you need. The science is out there. Now, I can make purposeful food. I want fuel to be this high-efficient athlete, but I want it to taste good. I want it to look great. I don’t want it to look like I’m shoving it down my throat or anything like that. It’s a structure. It’s a complete change of the American diet that I’m taking this approach from.

I’m capturing the evolution we’ve done so far with preferring more plant-based stuff, more sustainable stuff. My protein structure is predominantly plant-based. All the foods that I’m making and food, I make sure to have my protein be predominantly plant-based, like pea stuff, seeds. I took some falafel and put some really good stuff in it, and rolled it down tight and sliced it thin, almost like pepperoni, little patties. I fried those little patties off and I topped that on different foods and stuff.

With that restructuring, the primary proteins on the plant-based, I still use my animal fats. Most of my fat structure does come from [animals]. I use plant fats, but my animal products come from my animal fats: my dairies, my cheeses, my tallows, my little bits of lard that I like to stick into things to make it a little crispy and give it that umami taste. You don’t need a lot! That’s the beauty. Because you’ve learned about nutrition, one tablespoon of fat is about sixty to a hundred-twenty calories – two tablespoons is one-hundred twenty – so you start to dial in now. “Hey, I can make this great product. I can change the type of fat that we’re using, reduce it, so I can get my fat count. I can get the protein that I need from this.”

Then the carbs. We’re in America. America loves its carbs: breads, cakes. So when I started thinking about American cuisine in a diet, I couldn’t ignore that. We like our healthy food. We like our carbs. We like our protein-based stuff. And I know we like our big portions, but that’s another thing I’m trying to change. I’m shrinking that portion size down and taking more of the conscious approach to eating. This is this portion size for this reason. I’m putting it into my fitness stuff. So when people look at me and they say, “Man, what are you eating, and why are you eating that much?” “Well, this is what I’m eating, and I’m eating this much because this is what is necessary to fuel my body. This is how I get shredded in the gym. This is how I have the energy to go run a marathon and then come back here and cook. It’s the food.” It’s the American diet, which is going to translate over to American cuisine now. The cuisine development is actually a byproduct of the need to change the diet.

Trenin Nubiru’s Ultimate Dish

Kirk Bachmann: I love the critical thinking piece. Raise your hand if you think that Trenin has a future in teaching. Raise your hand. Raise your hand.

We’ve kind of come to the end of our time today but not the end of our time together. We have one other question. I think I know where you’re going to go with it. It’s a beautiful question. The name of our The Ultimate Dish. I need to ask you: what is the ultimate dish? I think it is over your shoulder.

Trenin Nubiru: The ultimate dish is the cookie. I grew up eating cookies. I worked at a cookie shop. I love the cookie. The cookie has so much flexibility to me. I’m surprised I haven’t seen more use of it in competition, maybe. It’s something I’ll probably bring to it. It’s more than just a stand-alone. It can also serve as a good structure for things. You can manipulate it in so many ways. You’ve got the…

Kirk Bachmann: I’m not going to argue! The cookie. I’m not arguing that at all.

Trenin Nubiru: The cookie, I actually made a cookie. I’m going to bring it. It’s for you. I made it. It’s a completely custom recipe. I did a chocolate chip cookie. I felt like a chocolate chip cookie is pretty American. Growing up on Famous Amos cookies and things like that. Oh. Chips Ahoy! Toll House. I thought a chocolate chip cookie was pretty American, so I was like, “Let me take this chocolate chip cookie and do something with it.

So I did a brown butter infusion into the chocolate chip cookie while playing with the different types of sugars. I did use a little bit of a liquid sugar to keep it a little bit more malleable, increase the hygroscopic properties and everything. I filled the cookie as well. I did a toasted pecan ganache. I didn’t want to do a bunch of pecans in the chocolate chip cookie, but I do like the taste of pecans with my chocolate.

Kirk Bachmann: Brilliant.

Trenin Nubiru: I did a toasted pecan ganache that’s layered inside of the cookie. Then I did both a chocolate and vanilla buttercream decoration on top just to practice different piping techniques.

Kirk Bachmann: I’ve got to take a picture when you pull that up. Look at that. This is a first! This is a first on The Ultimate Dish. Oh my goodness! Oh my goodness, the ultimate dish. Look at that cookie! That’s beautiful, buddy. I love that.

Trenin Nubiru: Chocolate chip cookie with a toasted pecan ganache filling.

Kirk Bachmann: Oh my goodness.

Trenin Nubiru: This is a mixture. All the darker parts are chocolate buttercream, and all the lighter parts are the vanilla buttercream.

Kirk Bachmann: That is the ultimate dish by Chef Trenin. How about it? How about it?

Hey, my friend, thank you so much for spending some time with us. Wow! What an hour! What an absolute hour. I’m super proud of you. I love you. I wish you nothing but success, and I’ll keep you posted. We’ve got lots of stuff coming up in the next couple of months here at the school, and I want you a part of all of it.

Trenin Nubiru: Thank you so much. I love you. I appreciate you for everything you’ve done for me. Definitely, number one chef in my life. I’m going to always use you as a resource.

Kirk Bachmann: Always. You better. You better. I’m always here for you buddy. Thank you man.

Thank you for listening to the Ultimate Dish podcast, brought to you by Auguste Escoffier School of Culinary Arts. Visit escoffier.edu/podcast to find any materials mentioned during the podcast, including notes, links and other resources. And if you can, please leave us a rating on Apple or Spotify, and subscribe to support our show. This helps us reach more aspiring individuals ready to take the next step toward their dream careers. Thanks for listening.

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