Magic, lost and found

PART 1: Hector's Cheese Enchiladas

Dear Melanie,

I’ve been thinking a lot about the power of writing a letter during the past few days. It was a funny and sad kind of weekend, and letter-writing played a small part in making it a little bit better.

Christmas is approaching, as you well know. At our place, the Christmas elf has reappeared on our shelf, there’s an oversized tree taking up too much space in the lounge room, and on Friday night we hosted the first of several Christmas gatherings for beloved family and friends.

The next morning, after a very late night and while half-heartedly scrubbing our way through the mountains of washing up, my daughter and I had a difficult conversation.

It started with her asking me a question - possibly the question - about what goes on during the night on Christmas Eve. The children at my daughter’s school had been talking, you see, and some of them had a thing or two to say that gave my little girl cause for concern.

(And I’m going to pause right here and suggest that if there is a small person reading over your shoulder at the moment, you might wish to table this letter for later, when you have some privacy. If you catch my drift).

My little girl looked me in the eye and asked me, point blank, “Mum, do you promise that it’s not you and dad who give us the presents?”

There was nowhere to run, she was waiting expectantly for my answer, and I hesitated. It was an impossible choice: break her heart, or break her trust.

I couldn’t break her trust - I just couldn’t. I need her to know that she can turn to me, trust me, and rely on me, no matter what. So I told her the truth, and the revelation went as badly as it could possibly have gone. It genuinely did break her heart. Her face crumpled inwards, her eyes went as big as saucers, and she burst into tears, racing up to her bedroom.

And that’s where she stayed for the next three hours, sobbing. I felt - still feel - utterly awful. I was witnessing a growing-up moment, a loss of her childlike naivety, the end of magic in her world, and the unravelling of all the anticipation she had felt the season.

With lightening speed, she made all the connections. “That means…” and like pins dropping into balloons, there went the Easter Bunny, the Elf on a Shelf, the Tooth Fairy, even Tatiana the fairy who had lived in our back yard and been my daughter’s pen-pal since she was three. Pop, pop, pop. Pop!

The funny thing is, she didn’t feel deceived by me, that wasn’t the source of her distress. Instead, she told me accusingly, “I needed a few more years.” She wanted me to lie to her, “Just for a few more years.” I tried to comfort her. “Father Christmas was a real person,” I started to say, “Saint Nicholas—” but she interrupted me before I could finish, all the bitterness and loss and hurt in the world packed into in three heartbreaking syllables: “Santa’s dead!”

I retreated downstairs with tears in my own eyes, and contemplated what to do. When there is so much to be said, but the person you love simply cannot hear your words, what is there to do? I made a comforting cup of tea and, after the kettle boiled, sat down in our front room to write my daughter a letter.

In it, I told her how much I loved her, and how sorry I was to have caused her sadness. I told her I hoped that one day she’d find some comfort in the knowledge that her dad and I had worked so hard to bring magic and wonder into her world.

And I told her with honesty (and if nothing else, she knew I would tell her the truth!) that I believed in magic. That real magic was evidenced, for example, in the fact that trees can talk to one another - and even feed their young - via fungus on their roots. Primitive peoples in Peru created stunning - and scientifically accurate - images in the desert that could only be seen from the air, and that is ancient magic. And I wrote about the moment in which the magic of Christmas overcame the evil of war, and inspired soldiers to gather and sing together across enemy lines on Christmas Eve during WWI. That is magic I will believe in forever.

I wrote that while mums and dads may help to make some magic happen, we’re not faking it. There is so much magic in the world that we don’t see or understand, but that we experience every day, if only we are willing to accept it.

My daughter won’t be able to take all these words in right now, she’s just too heartbroken. But I hope that over time, they will bring her some comfort.

There’s power (and magic?) in writing a letter. As I sat by the window and wrote, I felt my own distress lift, ever-so-slightly. I was able tell my little girl how much I loved her, and I was able share these stories about magic without her shutting me down. She might not have been ready to hear my words, but one day, when the time was right, I knew she’d be able to read them. And maybe read them again, if she so desired.

Over time, I hope that my letter will become a harbinger of hope, a realisation that not all magic is lost.

All of this is to say, Melanie, that I am in powerful need of comfort food tonight. Something that is easy to cook, warming to the heart, and feels like a culinary hug.

Something like Hector’s cheese enchiladas, and his homemade red chilli sauce.

Diane shared the recipe for these enchiladas for Meals in the Mail, in memory of her father, Hector. He had passed away only a handful of months before she wrote to me, so this recipe, which was so special to him, had become powerfully special and emotional for her.

The lined index cards on which she’s hand-written the recipe are embellished with little pink hearts drawn in the corners, posted in a tiny envelope the colour that tomatoes go when you combine them with cream to make a delicious pasta sauce. On the front of the envelope, she’s dotted the i in my name with a little star, and carefully gone through all the round letters in the address and coloured them in with a luminous orange pencil.

The love in her letter is palpable.

For my part, I’m hoping that the substantial combination of cheese, chilli sauce, tomatoes and cumin in Diane’s recipe will create one of those meals that sticks to the sides of your insides, holding you together when you feel frail and fragile.

I mean, is there any combination more comforting than carbs and melted cheese?

I might pair it with a refreshing salsa though, to cut through some of that richness, or follow it with a leafy salad dressed very simply with lemon and salt.

The rains have returned as I write to you, soft summer rains that smell like childhood on a holiday. It’s the perfect evening to melt chilli and cheese.

With love,
Naomi x

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RECIPE: Hector’s Cheese Enchiladas

For the enchiladas:

• 12-14 white corn tortillas

• 3-6 cups shredded cheddar cheese

• 1 cup of thinly shredded cabbage

• 1 roma tomato, diced

• 1/4 cup of crumbled cotija cheese* for topping, optional

• Sour cream, for topping

• Hector’s homemade red sauce (see below)

INSTRUCTIONS

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees Fahrenheit

2. Spread a thin layer of enchilada sauce over the bottom of a 9 x 13 inch baking pan

3. Fill each corn tortilla with a handful of the cheese, roll up and place seam-side down in the baking dish. You can pack them closely together. Smooth enchilada sauce over the top. Sprinkle a little bit or a lot of extra cheese (shredded) on top of the enchiladas

4. Bake for about 25 minutes or until cheese is melted and sauce is bubbly. Top each enchilada with a little shredded cabbage, diced tomatoes, cotija cheese and sour cream

Serve with Spanish rice and refried beans.

For the red sauce:

• 3 Tbsp oil

• 2 Tbsp flour

• 1/4 cup chilli powder

• 1 Tbsp cumin

• 2 cups beef broth

• 2 1/2 cups tomato sauce

• 1/2 tsp oregano

• 1 clove of garlic

• salt to taste

Stir oil, flour, chilli powder and cumin in a saucepan on low heat until bubbly. Add beef broth, tomato sauce, oregano, garlic and salt. Simmer on low for 15 minutes, stirring occasionally.

* I had to look up what cotija cheese was, and found the answer on gourmetsleuth.com. They said:

“Cotija cheese is a Mexican, dry grating cheese made with cow's milk and is similar to Parmesan. In the U.S., you may find a fresher, softer version, similar to Feta, but in Mexico, this salty cheese is typically aged at least 100 days. Cotija is named after the Mexican city of Cotija, Michoacán.”