b'Chef GandunscriptedWHY DO YOU DO WHAT YOU DO?I always say I didnt pick this profession, it chose me. I love my ingredients and how they react toeach other, but I also just love the dance of cooking. It feels right to me, makes sense in a waynothing else does, and I get the chemistry and physics of it and find it fascinating. I love themovement it takes to create something in the kitchen. It makes me feel like I am an artist as wellas a nurturer and an entertainer, all at the same time. Plus I get to connect with people in a waythats really intimate and personal, creating valued memories with them.plus, I love to eat! WHAT IS YOUR FIRST FOOD MEMORY?Well, I used to pretend to cook when I was 5 or so, vigorously stirring together flower buds from mymothers day lilies with some little pods off a neighbors tree and a bit of waterand voil! Soup!And then there were the mud meatballs, tossed leaf salad and mud pies we made daily; we wereeven caught on camera by a Life magazine photographer making them. But Im not sure thatsREALLY food, so my early tasting memory is tasting the bliss of the simple combination of butterwhipped with powdered sugar to make a simple frosting for cakes. I might have been 5 or 6, and my mother was whipping it together for something. After I discovered it, I actually kept a jar of itway under my bed to sneak a taste after bedtime.WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE DISH TO EAT?TO PREPARE?Probably a fried-egg sandwich on caraway rye toast made by my husband, or just a piece ofcold fried chicken. I love to make meatballs, and lots of them. First for spaghetti that night and then for meatballsandwiches later in the week, then reheated on top of pasta. I love to eat them hot or cold and caneven be caught stabbing a cold meatball out of the fridge late at night for a snack, eating it almostlike a popsicle. I find the secret to good meatballs is to use half beef and half pork. The pork keeps things tender and moist. All-beef ends up with a slightly grainy texture, and too firm.I also make a lot of apple pies at home, mostly with and for my kids. I have one daughter, Ella, whocould eat apple pie for breakfast, lunch and dinner, and so she does when there is one in the house.And my husband says Im never happier than after Ive been crimping a pie crust. I have mygreat-grandmothers rolling pin and use it to roll the dough so I feel a little like she is there in the kitchen with me, watching over me as I work the dough, carefully and with love.IS THERE A FOOD YOU HATE/DONT LIKE?I detest fruitcake, did even before I lived in England for three years and had to make it all thetime for guests at the country-house hotel where I worked. I suppose it was good at one time, butit turned into such an industrial food, more like a construction supply, with its brick-like shape,than food to feed the soul.IF YOU COULD HAVE ONLY ONE FOOD FOR THE REST OF YOUR LIFE,WHAT WOULD THAT FOOD BE?Probably eggs. They are so flexible and magical that I dont think I would tire of them.WHAT OR WHO INSPIRES YOU?I get inspired from everywhere: artists, paintings, penny candy, my mother-in-laws cooking, otherpastry chefs work, flowers, foreign countries, my painting teacher Moe Brooker from college, myhusband, my children, the grocery store, the farmers market, the autumn leaves.stuff like that.'