Like Water for ChocolateKourtnee’s Mexican Cooking BlogBook by Laura EsquirelProject by Kourtnee Naegler

Summary of the book The book Like Water for Chocolate follows the story of Tita

and her true love Pedro. Tradition in the Tita’s household forbids her from marrying Pedro because since she is the youngest daughter, she must take care of her mother until the day she dies. This leads to Tita’s older sister Rosaura to marrying Pedro, and leaving Tita heartbroken and frustrated, since Pedro still vows to love her more than anyone else. This story revolves around Tita and Pedro and the true test of their love, if it can withstand anything. Tita cooks and the recipes included in here express her emotion that cannot come out in anything else. The whole book is centered at the turn of the twentieth century with the Mexican Revolutionary taking place. (Esquirel).

Mexican Christmas Rolls In my review of this book, one thing that especially stood

out to me was the recipes and the food. I have decided to make a couple of different recipes in this book. The first recipe I have decided to make is the Christmas Rolls. This is because Tita, the main character in this book, claims to favorite these rolls over most other food. This is also how the book is started out in the month of January with these rolls. I thought it was an important thing to honor this. In making these rolls, my review for them is that they were very good. (Esquirel 4). I can see why Tita likes these, the spiciness of the chorizo combated nicely with the saltiness of the sardines. This makes those salty little fish almost bearable

Kourtnee’s Review Christmas Rolls

Rating: 8/10 I thought the Christmas Rolls were very good! I was

not a big fan of the sardines, which is why this recipe did not get a 10/10. The spice in this recipe was very good. It reminded me of the sausage rolls my great grandma used to make. Those were very Italian, so it was interesting to see how the two cultures had variations on these rolls. I felt like Tita making these. I cheated and bought store made dough in order to save time, but next time I want to make my own! Overall, I would make this recipe again. It was fairly easy and delicious!

Recipe Christmas Rolls

1/2 lb chorizo 1 small onion, diced fine 1 serrano or jalapeno, diced fine (seeds/ribs

removed if desired) 1 pinch dried oregano veg oil as needed salt and pepper to taste Pillsbury breadstick dough

Is that Tita or Kourtnee?

Serrano Peppers and Onions

Oregano, salt, and Pepper Melting butter and putter in Vegetables

Mexican Blanco Cheese and Sardines :p

Cooking my “buns” off

Hard at work Stirring!

Folding Christmas Rolls

Yucky Sardines In a can!

Filling all done!

Time to bake!

Overall Thumbs up!

Family Verdicts Mother 8.5/10

Family VerdictsNana 10/10

Family VerdictsBrother 7/10

P.S. My brother is a chef, so this was very nerve racking!!

Family Verdicts Father 8/10

He wasn’t sure….

Cream Fritters The next recipe I decided to review for this project was for

the month of October, the cream fritters. I choose these for a variety of reasons. One, this was an easy recipe that I knew that I would like. The second reason I choose to make these is because I like the part of the book this recipe represents. In this part, Tita is talking to her sister Gertrudis who insists that Tita needs to tell Pedro she is pregnant with his child. Tita makes these as a request of her sister. This part of the story touches me because it is just another speed bump in the love of Pedro and Tita, where Getrudis almost tries to help their relationship in a way. (Esquirel 185). The cream fritters were very good. The fresh cream inside bursted with hints of cinnamon and sweet pockets of syrup. These are something I would make on a summer night.

Kourtnee’s ReviewCream Fritters

Rating: 5/10 These were a lot harder to make then I originally thought

they were going to be. The process of making the custard was very difficult in trying to cook it all evenly. It was also hard to wrap the custard in egg white, and getting the whole thing covered! This recipe reminded a lot of American French toast, just without using bread! I thought these tasted okay, but were not as good as I thought they would be. The outside was like fried dough, and the inside reminded me of a flan. If I were to make these again, I would try to perfect these and wrap the custard with more egg white. I would also maybe change it to a pancake batter next time in order to help the texture of it! That is just my personal opinion though!

Cream Fritters Recipe

6 large eggs1 cup heavy creambutter to grease pot1.5-2 cups oil for fryingcinnamonsyrup

Making Fritters for Gertrudis

Separating egg whites and yolks

Custard Cooking! Whipped egg whites

Coating the custard Trying to multitask!!

Cream Fritters Served!Going In!!!

“Please don’t burn!”

Sprinkle of Cinnamon

Serve with Maple Syrup

It was okay…

Family Verdicts Mother 4/10

Family Verdicts Nana 11/10

Family Verdicts Brother 10/10

“Look Mom! No Fork!”

Family Verdicts Father 6/10

Will the chef go on?

Even though this was for a project, I would love to continue to go on and cook more recipes from this book! Maybe next will be quail with rose petal sauce….

To theme or not to theme, that is the

question The way Like Water for Chocolate correlate with this

revolution is that is not only used as a backdrop for the story, but also as a concept/theme. Elena can be seen as the old government, who imposes the old laws. Tita can be seen as the young rebel, who falls into the old rule, but then imposes it. This ends up causing love, war, sacrifice, and death, just as any revolution would. The Mexican Revolution was something that changed time. It was young rebels opposing old rule. This caused a lot of problems, but in turn at the end of this story, changed people’s lives. (Esquirel, Stearns). In this, I believed the Christmas rolls represented the rebellion, and Tita, with her rebellious behavior. The cream fritters represented love. This is because Gertrudis was making them in the kitchen with Sergeant Trevino. That shows teamwork and in turn, love. <3

In Conclusion

Overall, I thoroughly enjoyed this book. I liked how each chapter was introduced with a recipe, with the back-story behind that recipe. This is something that not only made the book fun to read, but it also made this book personal. Another thing I liked in the book was the complexity of the situations. Nothing was ever easy for Tita, and new challenges were introduced to her daily. I think this relates to real life, because life is always throwing curve balls, usually to strike a person out. Tradition, rebellion, and forbidden love made this one of those books you can’t put down. This story captured that. This story captures life in a way that is beautifully simple and magical.