GIVING THANKS FOR DANCE

It’s the end of November: do you know where the year has  gone?

 On these oh-so-long  autumn and winter nights, I tend to feel somewhat disoriented. Though my clock says it’s 6:30, because it gets dark so quickly, I feel like it’s already 10:00pm! I feel all paranoid, like I’m gonna get into full-on hibernation mode, and just eat and sleep my nights away. To avoid that, I start looking for “year end” tasks to tackle.

Usually, these are little things I’ve let slide during the past months, and haven’t been able to get to during the commotion-and constant travel- of spring and summer Dance Festival Season. Things like finally unpacking and cleaning out all my gig bags, organizing a CD shelf, throwing away outdated  make-up, sewing hooks and making alterations on costumes, and getting a jump on sorting my tax receipts. Feeling a mild sense of accomplishment, I then move onto lists… holiday card lists, lists of presents, and lists of things I want to accomplish in the next year.

Though it may sound a little overly sentimental, since Thanksgiving is approaching, I made a Dance List of everything I am thankful for.

Dancing literally changed my life. On top of the “usual” benefits, like giving me a strong, toned, flexible body, the emotional and spiritual impact dancing has had upon me is so significant, I can hardly put it into words. In my writing, I am usually a confirmed abuser of the exclamation point, but the amount of punctuation I would need to apply in this case is boundless, so I will spare you.

From the age of three, I wanted to dance, but for many reasons (the foremost being a ballet teacher who rejected me at an early age because my feet were flat ) dancing wasn’t in the cards for me until  well after I had already reached adulthood.

Maybe I had a karmic debt to pay, maybe my life just unfolded the way it was supposed to, but I came to belly dancing fairly late in life, after the age of thirty. Though I still sometimes wish I had been able to study dance since childhood, I no longer feel robbed, or the regret I used to experience about not having been a life-long dancer; now I am just thrilled with the way things turned out!

Mere months after I began belly dancing-almost as a lark- my life did a full 360 degree turn-around. Instead of picking my body (and all the individual parts) to pieces by visually and physically comparing myself to unrealistic and “ideal” images in the media, I began to love my body for the way it looked while I was dancing. Soon, that sentiment morphed into simply loving my body. As I developed more skill, I began to be grateful for what my body could do.

Dancing also helped me quit some very self-destructive behaviors I had for decades: substance abuse and an eating disorder. A hardcore bulimic for years, my love of dancing helped me cultivate a healthy relationship with food…and need I tell you that it’s impossible to dance for hours with a hangover or while high? Suddenly, I had a choice to make and I picked dancing over controlled substances and being unhealthy.

Dancing helped me get through-and over- a painful divorce. The feminine energy and sisterhood I felt with other dancers was healing and gave me hope. I see this theme repeated with many other dancers, and I hope I can pass this feeling on to others.

Belly dancing also lead me to other forms of dance, and  for that, I am eternally grateful. It’s what directly lead to my career in burlesque, not to mention studying and performing other types of dance as well, like jazz, ballet, Bollywood, samba, contemporary, hip-hop and many other genres. Whenever my schedule ( or my creaky ole body) allows, I take dance classes.

Dancing has also allowed me to meet thousands of incredible, beautiful, intelligent and talented women the world over… that I may never have met normally during the course of my everyday life. Through dancing, I have made life-long friends with many strong women of all ages, shapes and sizes who are veritable super-heroines; they are giving, driven,  talented, and usually very witty to boot.

I’ve met dancers who are emergency room nurses, teachers, criminal attorneys, children’s advocates, speech therapists, accountants, trauma counselors, ranchers, authors, film festival curators, architects, coal miners, political activists, rock stars, explosives technicians, police women, sitcom actors, college professors with PhD’s… not to mention mothers, grandmothers and even great-grandmothers…and all of them are serious dancers!

I am thankful that I live in a country where women are free to dress as they please, to dance for joy-or professionally if they choose- and where dancing is considered an art-form.

Every day I give thanks that dancing, something I have always done only for love is also what I do for work, and how I make a living. I never take this for granted, sometimes I have to pinch myself to make sure my life is real. When I walked into my first belly dancing class, if anyone would have told me that within a fairly short time I was going to turn professional-not to mention have a career  over twenty years later- I would’ve laughed so uproariously, the walls of the studio would’ve blown apart!

My dance career – my performing and teaching- has taken me all over the globe and I have loved every moment of it. It was a far-fetched wish, and that wish came true. The only thing I might add here (and believe me, my tongue is firmly planted in my cheek!) is the old adage about “being careful what you wish for”. Had I known that my wish was actually going to come true, I probably would’ve added in a clause allowing me to have a luggage valet and a personal massage therapist travel with me!

I am so thankful for all the wonderful women who have sponsored me to teach and perform. Sponsors are super-human, and in addition to paying for my travel, feeding me, housing me, fulfilling my backstage requests, and staying up til the wee hours talking shop, many of them have also gone wa-a-a-ay above and beyond the call of duty. They have taken me sight-seeing, brought me to amazing shows, given me gorgeous gifts, taken me hot-tubbing, booked me massages- even brought me to the emergency room, or dealt with my tearful grief when I was thousands of miles away from home and my beloved kitten disappeared. You ladies know who you are, thank you so very much! In general, my sponsors have gone so far out of their out of their way to make me feel comfortable when I am on the road, I cannot thank them enough; most of them have become life-long friends.

I am very grateful for my teachers and dance-mentors, women  ( and men!) who were dancing professionally long before I even  thought of starting to dance…all of whom were very generous with sharing their knowledge of not only technique, but also practical application, not to mention costuming ideas, crowd-control skills and career- building know-how.

My students, whether on-going pupils or one-time workshop attendees, make me feel such gratitude, I can’t even verbalize it. I learn something new from them every day!  The  drummers  and musicians I’ve worked with  are amazing and  love what they do… and  aside from learning a lot from them,   I love them for  caring, cause our shows have always been fabulous!

I would like to thank "the audience" too- where would any dancer be without you? There is almost nothing more fulfilling than hearing an appreciative audience and seeing smiling faces in a darkened theater, just ask any performer! And of course,  all the behind-the-scenes people, those who never get enough thanks, like the artful  lighting and sound technicians,  all the harried- but unbelievably competent stage managers ( many of whom  are volunteers)  the  talented photographers and graphic artists I’ve worked with….and of course,  my long-suffering  friends and my boyfriend; all patiently waiting  for me to:

  a) get off stage  b) get my bag  packed up  c) stop talking about dancing!

Last but not least, I also gotta say that I am so very grateful for having a job that has the best, most amazing “uniform” EVER- what could be better than a blinged-out costume?

Happy Thanksgiving to all of you!

 In honor of the Holidays,  and to say  thanks to you,  I’m having a Black Friday-through-Cyber Monday  sale… many of my DVD’s and my new book Showgirl Confidential will be on sale for huge discounts here:

http://www.princessfarhana.com/video.htm

A BELLYFUL FOR THANKSGIVING

   Seriously, I cannot believe that Thanksgiving is next week!

  So,  at this point in the year, I'm done with all  my national and international travel, and looking forward to spending The Holidays at home...which means I'm getting ready to cook!  I cook like a fiend, and I love  to make fabulous food, but I'm usually not around to be able to.  The following recipe for stuffing is  a re-post from last year: Enjoy!

This is  an adaptation of a recipe for a scrumptious, sweet; savory and very spicy holiday dressing that has been in my family for over half a century. I have been eating it for as long as I can remember, and making it myself for at least thirty years.

 My entire family are great cooks; it’s in our blood! My sisters Eddie, Cupcake and I even had a ridiculously popular food blog for a few years called “The Haphazard Gourmet”, named after a popular cook book my father, the late author Richard Gehman, wrote in 1966, when I was a tot.

One of the biggest ironies in my life is that though I love to cook, I almost never have the chance to, because I am constantly on the road.

 During the holidays, when I am home, I always  cook up a storm, and this dressing is one of the things I love to make. It is extremely work intensive, and has a boatload of ingredients…but I’m tellin’ you, all the labor is worth it! Since it’s so very close to Thanksgiving, and you might  already have your meal plans set, you  maybe  will want to save this to make for Christmas or New Year’s Eve…  or just have a  Thanksgiving “rehearsal”!

Something that this stuffing has taught me over the years, is that if you are great cook and make something this luscious…

 SOMEBODY ELSE WILL OFFER TO CLEAN UP THE KITCHEN FOR YOU!

A little history  on the dressing itself: my father was a famous writer,  a bohemian bon vivant, and an extraordinary cook, who absolutely adored making-and enjoying- extraordinary food. Actually, now that I think about, my father was not unlike Don Draper from "Mad Men"! Anyway, before I was born, he interviewed his friend Morton Thompson, also a very well-known writer and man-about-town, and apparently this stuffing originated with Morton Thompson. I’ve put a link to my father’s article, and the original recipe at the bottom of this post, if you want to look it up.

This Gehman family take on Morton Thompson's recipe makes a ton of dressing, enough to feed an army and last you, your family, friends and neighbors for a few days so you can halve the recipe if you don’t want lots of leftovers… but of course you will want them, cause this dressing is the damn bomb!

Before I go into the exact details, you need to know a couple of the most important parts of the recipe.

The first thing is that there was a reason my father’s book, and our family cooking blog, were both called “The Haphazard Gourmet”. It’s because we improvise freely in the kitchen… swirling around like a tornado in an apron, using crazy ingredients, adding or subtracting them, making do with whatever is around.

Just like improvisation in dancing or acting, it’s fun to improvise in the kitchen. Don’t be scared to cook according to your own taste, and don’t feel lost without specific measurements. I’m  just giving you a guideline… don't be afraid of to making substitutions or adding in some new elements. My own personal version of this is quite different than the original version, but they taste similar and they’re both divine.

The second thing you need to know is that while you are making the dressing, you need to brag loudly, obnoxiously and continuously, or it simply won’t turn out right.

Tell everyone within earshot that you are not only foxy, but also the best cook on earth and they’re blessed just to be in the same house as you, inhaling the same oxygen that you’re breathing.

Tell them they’ll be on their knees kissing your feet- just after they take their first bite! Let them know you are an immortal being with culinary gifts from the heavens above…then let THEM clean up your mess…and thank you profusely the whole time!

Once I was cooking for Thanksgiving with my neighbor, and he had a recipe for dressing he got off the Internet, which he wanted me to make.

“Are you kidding?” I cried, “I never use recipes, I always cook by instinct! You’re gonna LOVE this!”

He regarded me suspiciously, like I was a teenage shoplifter.

“Ok,” he said finally, “But if you fuck this up, I’m going to be really mad.”

“No problem!”, I sniffed indignantly.

The moment he tasted my stuffing, a strange look came over his face… the kind of pie-eyed expression guys get in romantic comedies when they realize they’re in love. He finally shook it off and came back to earth, and exclaimed loudly,

“I will never doubt another word you say, as long as I am alive!”

Then he started cleaning the kitchen.

So: you will need a large frying pan with a cover, couple of small bowls, a couple of large bowls, aluminum foil, and two Pyrex or disposable aluminum baking pans.

INGREDIENTS:

Two boxes bread cubes or stuffing mix, of any type you prefer

Six stalks of celery- take off the strings

Two green peppers

Four large yellow onions

Six to ten fresh garlic cloves (or fresh mashed garlic from a jar)

A handful of loose white mushrooms

Two large apples (red or green, either is fine)

Two large oranges, or a medium sized can of Mandarin oranges

Two cans of sliced or chunk pineapple in plain water- not syrup

One large can sliced water chestnuts

One and a half giant handfuls of walnut halves or walnut pieces ** I have even thrown in pecans, and in some years added pre-made trail mix here as well. Like I said, improvise!

Two large containers of chicken or vegetable stock

Quarter pound stick of butter… if you don’t eat dairy, then eliminate this step, and just use more stock to keep the stuffing moist.

Four or five links of spicy Italian sausages- if you don’t like traditional pork sausage, chicken or turkey sausage is ok… and again, if you are a vegetarian, just eliminate the sausage altogether!

HERBS:

The herbs can be fresh or dried; it’s your call! Fresh is better though.

You’ll need rosemary, oregano, sage, marjoram and thyme… plus three or four large, whole bay leaves, and a small bunch of fresh parsley. The parsley must be fresh. Separate the leaves from the stems, and snip them up with a scissors.

If you’re using dried herbs, use a quite liberal pinch or about a very full teaspoon of each; for fresh herbs, then cut up a few leaves of each. I usually go heavy on the sage and rosemary for a more savory taste. Put these herbs into a bowl, mix them up, and set them aside for now.

SPICES:

I’ll say this again: I don’t measure when I cook, I do it mad scientist style!

 So, for the following spices, you’ll need a few very healthy shakes of each: salt, pepper, all spice, cinnamon, nut meg, curry powder, cumin seed, and cayenne pepper or red pepper flakes, turmeric, and a small chunk of fresh ginger, which you’ve peeled and sliced.

If you’re scared to spice up your food the way I do, then measure out about a quarter teaspoon of each, and put them in another small bowl, making sure they’re mixed up. Set these aside, too.

DIRECTIONS:

Cut up or dice all ingredients- EVERYTHING!

 This is the time consuming, hellish part. I usually dice everything into small, thin pieces, but I have also made late-night, post-gig rushed versions of this dressing where I carelessly chopped the peppers, celery and onions into larger chunks… so, whatever you want to do is fine. I cut the parsley with a scissors- and at the same time, if I am using fresh herbs, I cut them, too. If you want, you can also used diced packaged onions, cause crying while cutting onions is the worst, but I usually just weep my way through this part of the process.

Skin the sausages, and either crumble them or cut them into thin pennies, then get ‘em into in a very large frying pan or skillet with a little blop or two of extra-virgin olive oil, and start cooking them. If you are making the veggie version of this stuffing, just eliminate this step and start sautéing the veggies. You want the sausages cooked through, and a little browned. When the sausages are almost done, throw in the diced onions, garlic, peppers and celery, parsley, and a few generous pats of butter and stir. You will need to stir this continuously! Take a few pinches of both the herb mixture and the spice mixture and throw them both in, according to your taste.

Have a glass of wine here if you drink… or if you want to be like my father, make it a scotch.

 Make sure you’ve been bragging to whomever is around! If no one’s at your house yet, send a few texts, tweet about it, or update your status on Facebook about the manna from heaven which you are creating. Do it… remember, you need to brag or it won’t turn out right! Then preheat your oven to 350.

When the veggies have almost cooked, throw in the apples, walnuts, mushrooms, oranges, and pineapple, with all the juice from the can. Drain the can of water chestnuts and throw those in too. At this point, you will probably need more of the herbs and spice mixtures- I know I always do! And while you’re at it, just start adding more pats of butter like a crazy person with a death wish! Stir it all up well. Turn down the heat, put a lid on the pan, and keep stirring it occasionally. Take a taste and figure out if you need to add more herbs and spice… I know I would! While you’re at it, throw in some more butter.

Divide your bread cubes up into two large bowls. Prepare according to the package, but use your chicken or vegetable stock instead of water to moisten it up. Mix it well, and then slowly start adding in the big mess of ingredients you’ve got in the frying pan.

When you’ve gotten the entire contents divided into the two big bowls, start mixing it all up. Mix it until you think you’ll get carpal tunnel!

Take a few pats of butter and grease your baking pans, yelling loudly that you’re about to put this divine creation in the oven, and soon everyone’s going to be hearing the angels sing. Divide the well-mixed dressing into the baking pans, then put a few more pats of butter on top, cover them with the foil tightly, and pop ‘em into the oven.

Let them bake about fifteen or twenty minutes, then take the foil off, and let them bake another ten or fifteen minutes so that the top gets browned and crunchy. By this time, you’re going to be beating people out of the kitchen like a lunatic, because the whole house will smell amazing. Have them make you a drink and tell them they need to start cleaning up…cause the gorgeous aroma from the dressing you created just enriched their sad, humdrum lives!

Take the baking pans out of the oven and keep them covered until you serve them. I usually make this the night before, and keep them in the refrigerator until serving, because it allows the flavors and spices to marry. You can heat them up on Thanksgiving Day (or whatever day falls after you make this unearthly creation) and it’ll be even more divine.

Bon Appetite, and Happy  Up-Coming Holidays!

XO Princess

A link to a reprint of the original recipe for this dressing…and for an incredible turkey recipe, too is here: “Morton Thompson’s Turkey” by Richard Gehman:

http://www.whats-on.com/dining/magician-kitchen

GIVING THANKS FOR DANCE

It’s the middle of November, where has 2010 gone? On these oh-so-long winter nights, I tend to feel somewhat disoriented. Though my clock says it’s 6:30, because it gets dark so quickly, I feel like it’s already 10:00pm! I feel all paranoid, like I’m gonna get into full-on hibernation mode, and just eat and sleep my nights away. To avoid that, I start looking for “year end” tasks to tackle.

Usually, these are little things I’ve let slide during the past months, and haven’t been able to get to during the commotion-and constant travel- of spring and summer Dance Festival Season. Things like finally unpacking and cleaning out all my gig bags, organizing a CD shelf, throwing away outdated, stale make-up, sewing hooks on costumes, and getting a jump on sorting my tax receipts. Feeling a mild sense of accomplishment, I then move onto lists… holiday card lists, lists of presents, and lists of things I want to accomplish in the next year.

Though it may sound a little overly sentimental, since Thanksgiving is approaching, I made a Dance List of everything I am thankful for.

Dancing literally changed my life. On top of the “usual” benefits, like giving me a strong, toned, flexible body, the emotional and spiritual impact dancing has had upon me is so significant, I can hardly put it into words. In my writing, I am usually a confirmed abuser of the exclamation point, but the amount of punctuation I would need to apply in this case is boundless, so I will spare you.

From the age of three, I wanted to dance, but for many reasons ( the foremost being a ballet teacher who rejected me at an early age because my feet were flat ) dancing wasn’t in the cards for me until I had already reached adulthood.

Maybe I had a karmic debt to pay, maybe my life just unfolded the way it was supposed to, but I came to belly dancing fairly late in life, after the age of thirty. Though I still sometimes wish I had been able to study dance since childhood, I no longer feel robbed, or the regret I used to experience about not having been a life-long dancer; now I am just thrilled with the way things turned out!

Mere months after I began belly dancing-almost as a lark- my life did a full 360 degree turn-around. Instead of picking my body ( and it’s individual parts) to pieces by visually and physically comparing myself to unrealistic and “ideal” images in the media, I began to love my body for the way it looked while I was dancing. Soon, that sentiment morphed into simply loving my body. As I developed more skill, I began to be grateful for what my body could do.

Dancing also helped me quit some very self-destructive behaviors I had for decades: substance abuse and an eating disorder. A hardcore bulimic for years, my love of dancing helped me cultivate a healthy relationship with food…and need I tell you that it’s impossible to dance for hours with a hangover or while high? Suddenly, I had a choice to make and I picked dancing over controlled substances.

Dancing helped me get through-and over- a painful divorce. The feminine energy and sisterhood I felt with other dancers was healing and gace me hope. I see this theme repeated with many other dancers, and I hope I can pass this feeling on to others.

Belly dancing also lead me to other forms of dance, and I am eternally grateful. It’s what directly lead to my career in burlesque, not to mention studying and performing other types of dance as well, like jazz, ballet, Bollywood, samba, contemporary, hip-hop and many other genres. Whenever my schedule ( or my creaky ole body) allows, I try to take other dance classes.

Dancing has also allowed me to meet hundreds of incredible, beautiful, intelligent and talented women the world over that I may never have met normally during the course of my everyday life. Through dancing, I have made life-long friends with many strong women of all ages, shapes and sizes who are veritable super-heroines; they are strong and giving, driven, and usually very witty to boot. I have met dancers who are emergency room nurses, teachers, criminal attorneys, children’s advocates, speech therapists, accountants, trauma counselors, ranchers, authors, film festival curators, architects, coal miners, political activists, rock stars, explosives technicians, police women, sitcom actors, college professors with PhD’s… not to mention mothers, grandmothers and even great-grandmothers…and all of them are serious dancers!

I am thankful that I live in a country where women are free to dress as they please, to dance for joy-or professionally if they choose- and where dancing is considered an art-form.

Every day I give thanks that dancing, something I have always done sheerly for love is also what I do for work, and how I make a living. I never take this for granted, sometimes I have to pinch myself to make sure my life is real. When I walked into my first belly dancing class, if anyone would have told me that within a fairly short time I was going to turn professional-not to mention have a career twenty years later- I would’ve laughed so uproariously, the walls of the studio would’ve blown apart!


My dance career – my performing and teaching- has taken me all over the globe and I have loved every moment of it. It was a far-fetched wish, and that wish came true. The only thing I might add here ( and believe me, my tongue is firmly planted in my cheek!) is the old adage about “being careful what you wish for”. Had I known that my wish was actually going to come true, I probably would’ve added in a clause allowing me to have a luggage valet and a personal massage therapist travel with me!

I am so thankful for all the wonderful women who have sponsored me to teach and perform. Sponsors are super-human, and in addition to paying for my travel, feeding me, housing me and fulfilling my backstage requests, and staying up til the wee hours talking shop, many of them have also gone wa-a-a-ay above and beyond the call of duty. They have taken me sight-seeing, brought me to amazing shows, given me gorgeous gifts, taken me hot-tubbing, booked me massages- even brought me to the emergency room, or dealt with my tearful grief when I was thousands of miles away from home and my beloved kitten disappeared. You ladies know who you are, thank you so very much! In general, my sponsors have gone so far out of their out of their way to make me feel comfortable when I am on the road, I cannot thank them enough; most of them have become life-long friends.

I am very grateful for my teachers and dance-mentors, women who were dancing professionally long before I even started to dance…all of whom were very generous with sharing their knowledge of not only technique, but also practical application, not to mention costuming ideas, crowd-control skills and career- building know-how.

My students, whether on-going pupils or one-time workshop attendees, make me feel such gratitude, I can’t even verbalize it. I learn something new from them every day.

I would like to thank "the audience" too- where would any dancer be without you? There is almost nothing more fulfilling than hearing an appreciative audience and seeing smiling faces in a darkened theater, just ask any performer!

Last but not least, I also gotta say that I am so very grateful for having a job that has the best, most amazing “uniform” EVER- what could be better than a blinged-out costume?

Happy Thanksgiving to all of you!