Alice B. Toklas byla americká spisovatelka a klíčová postava pařížské avantgardy. Jako důvěrnice, partnerka a společnice Gertrude Steinové se stala nedílnou součástí literárního a uměleckého života své doby. Její vlastní literární dílo, ačkoliv často zastíněné Steinové, odráží její jedinečný pohled na kulturu a život v Paříži. Přestože byla většinu života vnímána jako postava v pozadí, její vliv na umělecké kruhy byl nepopiratelný.
When Alice B. Toklas was asked to write a memoir, she initially refused. Instead, she wrote The Alice B. Toklas Cook Book, a sharply written, deliciously rich cookbook memorializing meals and recipes shared by Hemingway, Fitzgerald, Wilder, Matisse, and Picasso. And of course by Alice and Gertrude themselves
Long before Julia Child discovered French cooking, Alice B. Toklas was sampling local dishes, collecting recipes, and cooking for the writers, artists, and expats who lived in Paris between the wars. Hemingway, Fitzgerald, Wilder, Matisse, and Picasso shared meals at the home she kept with Gertrude Stein, who famously memorialized her in The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas.The Alice B. Toklas Cook Book, however, is her true a collection of traditional French recipes that predates Child's Mastering the Art of French Cooking. Toklas supplies familiar recipes such as coq au vin, bouillabaisse, and boeuf bourguignon, along with what is perhaps the earliest instructions for haschich fudge (“which anyone could whip up on a rainy day"), and she entertains with fascinating memories of Paris-Toklas' home for most of her life-and of rural France, Spain, and America.