Gale Gand is a

Chicago (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name ...

-based

pastry chef A pastry chef or pâtissier (; the French female version of the word is pâtissière ), is a station chef in a professional kitchen, skilled in the making of pastries, desserts, breads and other baked goods. They are employed in large hotels, bi ...

, cookbook author, television personality, and winner of the 2001

James Beard Foundation The James Beard Foundation is a New York City-based national non-profit culinary arts organization named in honor of James Beard, a prolific food writer, teacher, and cookbook author, who was also known as the "Dean of American Cookery." The prog ...

Award for Outstanding Pastry Chef. Gand was the host of the

Food Network Food Network is an American basic cable channel owned by Television Food Network, G.P., a joint venture and general partnership between Warner Bros. Discovery Networks (which holds a 69% ownership stake of the network) and Nexstar Media Group ( ...

show ''Sweet Dreams''. She was the Chef-in-Residence at Elawa Farm, in Lake Forest, Illinois. Gand is a partner and was the founding Executive Pastry Chef at Tru, a contemporary fine-dining restaurant affiliated with

Lettuce Entertain You Enterprises Lettuce Entertain You Enterprises (LEYE) is a restaurant group currently comprising 120 or more restaurants mainly located in the Chicago metropolitan area. It was founded by Rich Melman and Jerry A. Orzoff in 1971. History The first restauran ...

. Gand and her partners at Tru won the 2007

Award for Service. She has blogged for the Huffington Post, was a contestant on Iron Chef America in the 2006–2007 season, and was a judge on Bravo's

Top Chef ''Top Chef'' is an American reality competition television series which premiered on Bravo on March 8, 2006. The show features chefs competing against each other in culinary challenges. The contestants are judged by a panel of professional ch ...

in 2008 for the episode Wedding Wars. Gand was also featured on the

Great Chefs Great Chefs is a franchise of 656 televised cooking shows ( +13 cookbooks), that began with thirteen half-hour programs produced for PBS nationally, entitled "Great Chefs of New Orleans" by John Beyer and John Shoup in New Orleans. Later PBS se ...

television program.

Biography

A native of Deerfield,

Illinois Illinois ( ) is a state in the Midwestern United States. Its largest metropolitan areas include the Chicago metropolitan area, and the Metro East section, of Greater St. Louis. Other smaller metropolitan areas include, Peoria and Rockf ...

, Gand began her restaurant career in 1976 working as a line cook and waitress in

Cleveland Cleveland ( ), officially the City of Cleveland, is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Cuyahoga County. Located in the northeastern part of the state, it is situated along the southern shore of Lake Erie, across the U.S. ...

Ohio Ohio () is a state in the Midwestern region of the United States. Of the fifty U.S. states, it is the 34th-largest by area, and with a population of nearly 11.8 million, is the seventh-most populous and tenth-most densely populated. The sta ...

, and then as a pastry chef in Rochester, New York. She later did pastry in

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the Un ...

at The Gotham Bar and Grill and in

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...

Stapleford Park Stapleford Park is a Grade I listed country house in Stapleford, Leicestershire, Stapleford, near Melton Mowbray in Leicestershire, England, which is now used as a hotel. It was originally the seat of the Sherard and Tamblyn families, later the Ear ...

. In 1993, Gand opened Trio with culinary partner and ex-husband

Rick Tramonto Richard Michael Tramonto (born May 30, 1963) is a Chicago chef and cookbook author. He was executive chef and partner in Tru, a contemporary fine-dining restaurant from Lettuce Entertain You Enterprises. Biography A native of Rochester, New York, ...

and Henry Adaniya in Evanston,

and was named among Food and Wine Magazine's Top Ten Best New Chefs in 1994. In 1999, she opened Tru with Tramonto and Lettuce Entertain You Enterprises's

Rich Melman Rich Melman (born 1942) is an American businessman, and the founder and chairman of Lettuce Entertain You Enterprises, a privately held restaurant company with more than 100 venues."Let Us Now Praise R.J. Grunts: How Rich Melman and his Lettuce ...

. The following year she started making Gale's Root Beer, a cinnamon ginger vanilla flavored artisanal soda pop, producing 60,000 bottles a year which sells nationally. In 1996, Gand was chosen by Julia Child to appear on two episodes of the PBS show Baking with Julia. Gand was the host of the Food Network show ''Sweet Dreams'' that ran on the network from 2000 to 2008. She got the show without a try out when calling the network to confirm a date to be on Sarah Moulton's show where she was a frequent guest chef. On July 30, 2006, Gale Gand and ex-husband Rick Tramonto appeared on Iron Chef: America. Losing to

Mario Batali Mario Francesco Batali (born September 19, 1960) is an American chef, writer, and restaurateur. Batali co-owned restaurants in New York City; Las Vegas; Los Angeles; and Newport Beach, California; Boston; Singapore; Westport, Connecticut; and ...

(53 - 46). In 2014, she partnered with Steve McDonagh and Dan Smith ( The Hearty Boys) to open SpritzBurger, a 2-year "pop-up" in Chicago. Also in 2014, Gand was inducted into the Chicago Chef's Hall of Fame. She was also inducted into the American Academy of Chefs in 2018. In 2016, Gand and other chefs, such as Laurent Gras and Matt Troost, collaborated with turkey and beef

jerky Jerky is lean trimmed meat cut into strips and dried (dehydrated) to prevent spoilage. Normally, this drying includes the addition of salt to prevent bacteria growth before the meat has finished the dehydrating process. The word "jerky" derive ...

producer, Think Jerky, creating signature jerky products. Some of Gand's creations included "Sriracha Honey Turkey Jerky," "Original Turkey Sticks," "Mini Original Turkey Sticks," and "Sesame Teriyaki Beef Jerky." She was previously married to underground cartoonist

Brian Bram Brian Bram (born May 9, 1955, in Chicago), raised in Deerfield, Illinois, played a minor role in the underground comix movement with his contributions to '' American Splendor'', the comic book series written and published by Harvey Pekar. Biograp ...

and is currently married to Jimmy Seidita. Gale has 3 children and plays the mandolin and ukelele.

Books

* Tramonto, Rick, and Gale Gand. 1997. ''American Brasserie''. New York: Wiley. * Gand, Gale, Rick Tramonto, and Julia Moskin. 1999. ''Butter Sugar Flour Eggs: Whimsical Irresistible Desserts''. New York: Clarkson Potter. * Gand, Gale and Julia Moskin. 2001. ''Gale Gand's Just a Bite: 125 Luscious Little Desserts''. New York: Clarkson Potter. * Gand, Gale and Julia Moskin. 2004. ''Gale Gand's Short and Sweet: Quick Desserts with Eight Ingredients or Less''. New York: Clarkson Potter. * Tramonto, Rick, Gale Gand, and Mary Goodbody. 2004. ''Tru: A Cookbook from the Legendary Chicago Restaurant''. New York: Random House. * Gand, Gale and Lisa Weiss. 2006. ''Chocolate and Vanilla''. New York: Clarkson Potter. * Gand, Gale, with Christie Matheson. 2009. ''Gale Gand's Brunch!: 100 Fantastic Recipes for the Weekend's Best Meal''. New York: Clarkson Potter. * Gand, Gale, with Christie Matheson. 2014. ''Gale Gand's Lunch!''. New York: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.

External links

GaleGand.com

SpritzBurger

Tru Restaurant

Think Jerky - Our Chefs

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Gand, Gale Living people American food writers American television chefs Pastry chefs People from Deerfield, Illinois 1956 births American women chefs Women cookbook writers American cookbook writers James Beard Foundation Award winners 21st-century American women