Like Water for Chocolate Final Review
Rick Shur's Answers
Question 1 (24 points possible)
Question: Give three examples of how dishes had an emotional effect on the people who ate them. Explain how
each dish's preparation caused the emotion, what ingredient or accidental ingredient was responsible, what the
emotion was, and how people acted after eating the dish.
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Tita cried into the icing for Rosaura's wedding cake, which caused everybody who ate it to feel pain
and frustration. The were crying over lost love and vomiting all over everything.
Tita's blood got onto the roses that Pedro gave her, so she decided, at Nacha's ghost's urging, to use
them for a quail with rose petal sauce dish. The dish acted liked an aphrodisiac on Gertrudis, whose
hot body burned down the shower stall before Gertrudis ran away, naked, with Juan, a rebel soldier
on his horse.
Chencha made Tita some ox-tail soup, which had onions. The onions reminded Tita of her
childhood and Nacha, and Tita was filled with nostalgia, which made her cry a river of tears that
flowed down the stairs of John's house.
For Esperanza and Alex's wedding, Tita made chiles with walnut sauce, and she was feeling so
much love while making the dish, that her emotion became one of the ingredients. It worked like an
aphrodisiac on the guests, who went crazy having sex wherever they could on the ranch.
Question 2 (12 points possible) Give the first names of Laura Esquivel's
a) mother- Esperanza
b) father- Alex
c) maternal grandmother (mother of her mother)- Rosaura
d) maternal grandfather (father of her mother)- Pedro
e) older great aunt (aunt of her mother)- Gertrudis
f) younger great aunt (aunt of her mother)- Tita
Question 3 (12 points possible)
Question: Mama Elena enjoyed cracking nuts. What does this symbolize? Talk about three males whose lives
were hurt or destroyed by Mama Elena.
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Juan de la Garza, Mama Elena's husband, had a heart attack and died when he learned that the father of
his middle daughter was not himself but a black man whom Elena secretly love.
Roberto was deprived of Tita's love and care when Mama Elena Pedro to take his family to Texas, so he
died.
Pedro was unable to marry the woman he really loved because Mama Elena wouldn't break the tradition
that required the youngest daughter to stay unmarried and take care of her. Furthermore, as an angry
ghost, she burned Pedro's body badly when she turned into a firecracker and breaking an oil lamp that
Pedro was close to.
Question 4 (15 points possible)
Question: Mama Elena made people suffer, but she also suffered a great deal. Talk about three ways that she
suffered in this story.
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Mama Elena could not marry the man she really loved.
Her husband died of a heart attack when he learned about the other man, and this left Elena alone.
She was badly beaten by bandits in her own home.
Elena's fear of Tita made her afraid to eat Tita's food, so she took syrup of ipecac, an emetic, which
made her vomit and finally die of malnutrition.
Question 5 (10 points possible)
Question: Chencha was raped by bandits. This did not prevent her from having a happy life. Talk about three
ways that Chencha was fortunate.
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Chencha had the love and friendship of Tita. She was able to restore Tita's mental health when Tita was
in a great depression after Roberto's death.
After she was raped, Jesus Martinez, her first sweetheart, married her despite the fact that she was no
longer a virgin.
She later had Jesus's baby.
She was lucky to have a job for herself and Jesus at the ranch, where she had Nacha and Tita as friends,
and room and board.
Question 6 (12 points possible)
Question: Tita experienced many different kinds of love for different people. Describe the different kinds of
love she felt for Nacha, Esperanza, John, and Pedro.
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Tita loved Nacha like a daughter.
She loved Esperanza like a mother.
She loved John like a best friend.
She loved Pedro like a lover and wife.
Question 7 (15 points possible)
Question: If Tita, Pedro, and Mama Elena were alive today, what do you think their opinions would be on the
Gay Marriage issue?
[Rick's Shur's opinion]
Tita would probably support gay marriage because she believed that love was more important than society's
rules. Pedro would probably be against gay marriage since it didn't follow social norms, but he would suggest
that a man might marry a woman and have a gay lover on the side, quietly. Mama Elena would probably think
that gay love was completely evil and that all gay lovers would go to hell.