[shroomgirl]

Loved your rifting on Mallomars, during my marshmallow obsessive stage I ran across your retro recipes. Where do you get your inspiration?

What's currently your focus?

[Gale Gand]

The inspiration actually came from my husband who grew up on different snack cakes than I did.

I also get inspiration from my childhood memories or my husbands childhood memories. A lot of my inspiration comes from antiques cookbooks, paintings, a beautiful piece of china, etc. Once I found a beautiful piece of china that gave me the idea to do an amazing banana split.

Other ways I find inspiration are just by searching through my grandmother's recipe card file. Actually the pear struesel coffee cake in my new book "Gale Gand's Brunch" came from my grandmother's recipe file. The original recipe called for apples but I used pears instead. It was a great recipe that was easy to make and works every time which made it a great addition to the book.

Another recipe from "Gale Gand's Brunch", the date orange muffins was from my mother's recipe file. So look through your grandma's and your mother's old recipe files for a little inspiration.