Throughout the novel Sassafras, Cypress, and Indigo Ntozake Shange illustrates the lives of three sisters who work to achieve their dream lives as African-American women in Charleston, South Carolina. While the mother encourages her daughters to pursue education, hopeful that it is a path to marriage and happiness, each of them ends up following different paths to assure their future. Indigo works to achieve an idea of her identity through her intriguing world of magic, immersed with hand crafting dolls. Her interest in spirituality is also highlighted throughout her journey. The West Coast draws in Sassafras, where she flourishes in the unique craft of fiber arts. Finally, dance is the form of art in which Cypress chooses. She pursues this talent in San Francisco, and flourishes just like her two sisters. The novel is unique in that Ntozake writes it in the form of letters, diary entries, and magic spells from each sisters’ individual point of view. The most compelling piece of this novel, however, is the way in which recipes have the power to keep a culture alive no matter the time or place a person may be.
Recipes and the art of cooking is interesting within itself, but also has the power to give the reader additional stories on the ancestry of one’s culture. The way in which people have always cooked together, eaten together, and shared food together has always meant more than just to fuel our bodies. They are more so practices and routines that speak on their own unique stories of culture. A simple recipe can tell who is the chef, what foods are available in a certain place, as well as what these components mean to a certain culture. As the three sisters and Hilda grow apart physically, food and recipes act as a fishing net for Hilda to reel in her daughters even when distance separates them from their home of Gullah land.
The way in which recipes pull in all the sisters, and keep them close to their culture, is illustrated mostly through Sassafras. Closer to the end of the novel, Hilda becomes nervous for Sassafras when Sassafras declares that she is going to begin celebrating Kwanzaa instead of Christmas. Sassafras was living in California at the time, placing immense physical distance between the mother-daughter duo. However, Hilda finds a way to intertwine her culture with Sassafrasses new decisions. She condemns her own worries by sharing her recipe for “Duck with Mixed Oyster Stuffing” with Sassafras and reminds her that even though Charleston is seemingly less radical than California, “…things change, even your mama…” (133). Shange makes it extremely clear in this section that despite differences in lifestyle, one’s culture can always survive. The way in which Hilda and her daughters’ culture continues to thrive through recipes amidst drastic changes in family and society proves the importance of maintaining the art of food which one was raised in. She emphasizes the importance of holding onto cultural roots in order to keep the culture alive and have rituals to pass onto the next generation. The art of cooking proves that with enough magic amidst our recipes, whatever a culture passes onto the next generation will hopefully be filled with the love and care which evidently, draws us closer to our family no matter the physical distance.