Like Water for Chocolate is a worldwide bestseller. The book tells the strange, often surreal, story of Tita De La Garza,
a young Mexican woman who is forced to take care of her mother until she dies. Tita is not allowed to get married either. However, she falls in love with Pedro, who asks her mother for Tita’s hand in marriage. The cruel, domineering Mama Elena forbids this and Pedro marries Tita’s
sister Rosaura instead, just to be near Tita.
The author, Laura Esquivel, employs a clever device in the telling of this tale: Each chapter begins with a recipe and it is during the preparation of each of these meals that the events in the story unfold. For example, when Tita is forced to make the cake for her sister’s
wedding, she cries and her tears fall into the icing mixture. At the wedding, when the guests eat the cake, they all become violently ill. Tita is the only one who is unaffected. With everyone throwing up everywhere, Rosaura’s wedding is ruined.
On another occasion, one of Tita’s meals acts as an aphrodisiac on her other sister, Gertrudis, who runs away with a soldier and becomes a prostitute.
When Tita meets a doctor named John Brown, he stirs something within her that makes her think that she could love him. John asks Tita to consider marrying him. Tita knows that she could be happy with Dr Brown, but she is also unable to forget the fact that Pedro was, and will always be, her first love, and even though he is still married to her sister, Tita finds herself torn between him and John Brown.
All the while, Esquivel’s descriptions of Tita’s recipes are so detailed, and often mouthwatering, that the reader can almost taste each of these dishes, making one experience the story on a kind of savory level.
Years go by and after the deaths of both Tita’s mother and sister Rosaura, Tita is finally able to be with her true love, Pedro. When they make love, their passion is so intense that it causes their spirits to leave their bodies and ignites a fire that burns Tita’s entire ranch down to the ground. The only thing that survives the fire is Tita’s recipe book, which she also used as a kind of diary. Tita’s niece Esperanza finds this book in which Tita recorded her life’s experiences. Later, Esperanza’s daughter inherits the cookbook and it is she who is the narrator of this story.