Like Water for Chocolate by Laura Esquivel.

Read for: Once Upon a Time Challenge

Tita, the youngest daughter in her family is required by family tradition to remain unmarried so she can take care of her mother in her old age.  As the story begins, a young man has come to ask for Tita’s hand.  Her mother, who is truly hateful, refuses but offers Tita’s older sister instead.  The young man (Pedro) accepts, in hopes that this will allow him to be close to Tita.  The rest of the book tells the story of Tita and Pedro and Tita’s family.

A major part of the story takes place in the kitchen because this is where Tita spends more of her time.  Tita is a very talented and magical cook and puts a lot of care into the meals she prepares.  Each chapter begins with a recipe and the preparation instructions are woven into the story.  When Tita prepares meals she unknowingly adds a little bit of her emotion which affects the people who eat her food.  Sometimes these effects are disastrous, sometimes they are hilarious. Tita’s food tastes bitter to her mother, causes one of her sisters to become obese and causes the other in a fit of passion to run off to find love.

The descriptions of Tita’s food are mouth watering.  Every time I picked the book up, I found I was hungry!  I could almost taste her meals as I read.  The book was light and funny and a quick read.

Like Water for Chocolate belongs to the magical realism genre.  I’ve read other books from this genre before without realizing that’s what they were!  These are books where magical elements appear in stories that are otherwise realistic.  I like this idea.  It’s kind of fun to think that I could cook my emotions into my food.  Overall, it was an enjoyable read.