Blog Installment April 21, 2011

Cooking is one of my pleasures in life. For those of you who know me, cooking for 10 people for dinner, 40 for a Seder, 50 for a Sit Down Bar Mitzvah or surprise 50^th Birthday Party or 70 for an Engagement Party is not unusual for me. Being on tour does not allow one to be able to cook as we don’t have kitchens in our numerous hotel stops. We are lucky to sometimes have refrigerators and microwaves! Many a night I am at the ice machine, collecting ice to save my perishables! Some of our cast members have coolers that go on and off of the bus!

I might have mentioned this in another blog, but I thought it would be fun to tell you about the two times I have prepared food for the cast/crew/musicians with help from other cast/crew/musician members.

The first time was at Thanksgiving. We of course, were in Ottawa, Canada for the week of Thanksgiving. We had 8 shows there with not a lot of down time. However, we did have mini kitchens, i.e. stoves and refrigerators and microwaves and pots and pans! The hotel was going to cater a Thanksgiving Dinner for all of us, but our company manager thought it would make the holiday more meaningful if a few of us could also cook our favorite holiday dishes/desserts. So we called the hotel and found out that even though we had the kitchens, there would only be three available and they didn’t have the right pots or mix masters that we needed. Peter, that wonderful man, was driving up from New York to stay with me for the week. Guess what? I had him fill the car with pots and pans and mix masters and the Cuisinart and every baking need you could imagine!  I baked a cheesecake, stuffing and chocolate mousse, our company manager borrowed my mix master and baked two different kinds of pies, another cast member came to use my kitchen and we made some candy. Others contributed bread, veggies, a salad and an appetizer. So it felt nice to have some homey touches to the day. Some of the other cast kids had family join us as well. A nice day, we had a show that night and over the weekend we had two shows Saturday and Sunday. With a little ingenuity and a lot of fun, the holiday was extremely meaningful for all of us.

The other holiday event with food that I helped organize took place on Monday, April 18, the first Seder for Passover. Now this is a little more complicated as it grew into a huge event. Let me start by saying we were in Green River, UT on Monday night as a stopover, we did not have a show that evening. We had been in Albuquerque the weekend before. They did have a Trader Joe’s, but it was not in a Jewish neighborhood and they only had Matzoh and Horseradish. Remember, there are no kitchens at the hotel in Utah and I only have an hour between when we would arrive and when the Seder would begin! It was a conundrum. Should I just do blessings and pass out Matzoh and bless wine and sing a couple of songs? Where would we get hard boiled eggs? Matzoh Ball Soup and Gefillte Fish were definitely out of the question. There were no kosher for Passover noodles and microwaved noodles taste yucky to say the least. I got some Mushrooms/Asparagus/Chicken Stock/shallots/Mushroom Soup hoping someone would be able to put them together for us to eat. Now I have to back up.

I wanted to have a Seder, but it was looking dire. I had no Hagaddahs, no music, no food, no kitchen…..who would come? What would I do? What parts of the Seder to make it more enjoyable for people who had never attended a Seder? I had a couple of ideas but needed to do research. In Albuquerque I talked to a few of the cast and the company manager to feel out when would be the best time to do a Seder and we all decided that Monday night would work before people went off  to do their individual thing…The hotel actually had a separate breakfast room with tables and chairs. So that was a go. There was a microwave in the lobby, which was a go. I went back to Trader Joe’s, bought Horseradish, apples, praline pecans, walnuts, and dates for Charoseth that we would put together Monday once we reached Logan. Sunday night after two shows, I went on the computer and started hunting for Hagaddah prayers and songs for the Seder. I was especially looking for a parody of “Clementine” that deals with the four sons, which we use in our Seder at home. I was thinking our “Russians” could be the sons and Father. Well, what do you know? There were several parody songs about Passover, all to very well known Musical Comedy Songs. This is a Musical Comedy Troupe. Hey, Hey Hey, we’ve got a show! I did the opening number with back up dancers, I had everyone take a blessing, Hebrew and English, 3 kids did the four questions, the musicians played saxophone, guitar and mandolin. Several of the cast and the violinist helped make the charoseth; our Yente, Birdie, made the Mushroom Machel for our festive meal. The hotel front desk lady let us have hard boiled eggs that were in the hotel’s refrigerator for Tuesday’s Breakfast!! Lots of the kids brought wine. What a day! Pictures and Videos were taken. It was a wonderful event, everyone loved it and we all were able to feel like we had had a celebration of a holiday that means a lot to us. It was our very own Anatevka Seder…..Tradition!!