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Summary
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in With the Fire on High, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Coming of Age and Teen Parenthood
Creativity vs. Professional Norms
Food and Connection
Caregiving, Independence, and Identity
Support, Community, and Mentorship
Summary
Analysis
This recipe serves “Your heart when you are missing someone you love.” It’s a pudding made with coconut milk, some sugar, lemon verbena and vanilla, and a garnish of cinnamon. After the pudding cooks on the stove and thickens, it’s poured into a cereal bowl to set in the fridge. When it’s set, the cook removes the bowl and sprinkles the domed pudding with cinnamon. It’s best eaten “cold while daydreaming about palm trees and listening to an Héctor Lavoe classic.”
Opening the novel with a recipe helps readers understand the role food plays in Emoni’s life. This pudding isn’t just a tasty treat. Rather, its whole purpose is to help soothe one’s (presumably Emoni’s) heart as she misses someone. Who that person is is left unclear, but it does indicate that Emoni has close relationships with people and wishes she could be around her loved ones more often.
Themes
