In the past few years, we've been doing amazing stuff with desserts. Pastry chefs have been using herbs and spices in their desserts. So vanilla cake doesn't have to be just vanilla, it can have a little thyme. Or you could have a custard with a little lavender in it, which is just amazing.

I have this problem - I don't have hobbies. Everything that's interesting becomes a vocation.

We used to be referred to as bakers and then we became known as cake decorators and now we are known as cake designers. I teach at the French Culinary Institute in New York and cake design is a legitimate profession.

On 'Sweet Genius,' you have to be tough with the chefs, but my goal was to guide them and choose the genius who will win $10,000 - not a bad sum at all for one day's work.

In my off-time, I do record. Once in a while, I'll just go into the studio if there's a really good song that I have in my head and want to do. I think, as artists, you're constantly in creative motion. If I stopped writing songs, then that's a part of me that would stop in my life, and I need constant motion.

I still believe that the best art - be it music, comedy, painting, etc. - is the art that hasn't been asked for, or is expected.

Loving a country is an act of the imagination.

Some people have been kind enough to call me a fine artist. I've always called myself an illustrator. I'm not sure what the difference is. All I know is that whatever type of work I do, I try to give it my very best. Art has been my life.