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The recipe exchanges between my mother and me began months before my son’s due date in April of this year. We sent texts and emails back and forth from her home in Houston to mine in Seville, Spain, with hungry anticipation of her trip to meet this new creature growing inside of me. From Indian dals and honey lactation cookies to anti-inflammatory, turmeric-laced everything, we were readying ourselves for this next phase of life: mine as a mother and hers as a grandmother. I nested in my own way, stocking the pantry with bags of brewer’s yeast, flax seed, and whatever else the internet told me to eat postpartum. I made odd Spanish American broths with chicken thighs and salted Ibérico pork bones, my belly swelling as I stuffed the freezer with schmaltzy, lard-laden stock.
I was born and raised in Houston. At eighteen, I graduated from high school and moved to Denver to attend college, living there for eight years. During that time, I studied abroad in Spain for a semester, where I met my now husband. A (very) long story short, we later reconnected, and I moved to Spain permanently in 2017. Eventually we got married, bought a home, and started a family.
My mom was already waiting for her connecting flight to Madrid when I called her from the bathtub to tell her I was going into labor. She’s not what I would describe as a loud person, but the entire Dallas Fort Worth International Airport must have heard her squeal. Along with her excitement, she carried notes and gifts from friends and family in the U.S. and a stack of printed recipes, and the ones she already knew by heart, like her Texas chili.
My mom refers to her recipe as George Bush Chili. Years prior, she ran a small prepared-soup business with her cousin, and unbeknownst to me, they once made the recipe for the former President George H. Bush himself.
She made chili fairly regularly when I was growing up. My mother is a fantastic cook, but to be honest chili was never one of my favorite dishes. Yes, I loved the rich stew poured into an individual bag of Fritos for a classic Frito pie at concession stands. I always went for the chili dog at James Coney Island with my grandma, the smoky liquid soaking into the soft white bun. But a whole bowl of just ground beef and beans? (My Texan mom’s chili has beans in it.) To me, it was nothing more than a vehicle for cheese and corn chips.
Once we were all finally home from the hospital with our tiny addition, my mom headed to the kitchen despite her own jet lag and exhaustion. She made lamb meatballs with saffron-stained rice, a blueberry almond cobbler, a healing chicken vegetable soup, and a familiar lentil stew with spinach and curry. There was a Provençal beef braise we happily ate for days. She brought me sesame oat bars and plates of goat cheese as I fed my son on the couch. She even sought out dairy-free meals when the pediatrician said it could help with the baby’s diaper rash (it didn’t).
A couple weeks into my postpartum daze, noticing my insatiable appetite, she suggested Texas chili. She had made it for my Spanish husband a few years ago while we were visiting Houston, and he went crazy for it. (I still think she suggested it for him rather than me.) But my hunger was overwhelming as I recovered from birth and nursed my son. A bowl of beef and beans? Sign me up.
Grocery shopping in a different country with a different language is not for the faint of heart. But my mom found her way through the confusing signs and labels— even made friends with our neighborhood butchers—and came home reluctantly with a cloudy meat stock she said was “weird,” cooked kidney beans in a glass jar, and a white English-style cheddar instead of the traditional yellow. The only available Fritos were what the Spanish Frito-Lay marketing team determined was “the Original BBQ Flavor” that doesn’t exist in the U.S. and frankly shouldn’t. “I don’t know how this is going to turn out,” she hollered from the kitchen.
My little one magically fell asleep in the bassinet beside me as we sat down for the meal. With two hands now free, I cupped the warm bowl and scattered the shredded cheese; I watched it slowly melt onto the steaming beef and beans. I tossed in the Fritos and mixed it up just enough so that the cheese emulsified into the broth but the chips would stay crunchy. The ground beef was perfectly tender, the beans creamy, and the broth tangy from the stewed tomatoes, with just a hint of smoke and spice. It tasted even better than I remembered—richer, more satisfying. I practically inhaled it and didn’t even reach for more Fritos. I asked for seconds.
When my mom left to go back to Houston, we all wept. But before she went back, she stocked the freezer with three quarts of chili to get us through those next months without her. Each container we thawed felt holy—like a treasure chest in the shipwreck of our newborn storm. Living an ocean away from family, especially as a new mother, is gut-wrenching, to say the least. To have that chili stored away let my mother’s presence linger just a while longer. It reminded me of Texas. It made me feel at home.
One day I’ll try to make it myself. I’ll invite Spanish friends over to share in this small part of my Texanness for which I constantly ache; they’ve already tried fajitas, smoked brisket, corn salsas, and chocolate pecan pie. And once my son is old enough, I’ll make it for him and tell him his grandma made this for a former president. Or maybe I’ll just wait until she comes back to visit because I doubt mine will taste as good.
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