The Artists' and Writers' Cookbook

Sausalito, California: Contact Editions, 1961. NF/G. Stated First Printing. The book is tight with solid hinges, good tips, and clean boards. The textblock is clean with no writing, bookplate, or markings and not BCE, ex-library, or remaindered. No dust jacket, as issued. The slipcase is intact and good with edgewear. 288 pages plus index. 7½" x 10" tall.

With an introduction by Alice B. Toklas, The Artists' & Writers' Cookbook is a 1961 cookbook with 220 recipes and 30 courses contributed by famous writers and artists. Editors Beryl Barr and Barbara Turner Sachs asked contributors to submit cooking-related stories or favorite family recipes. The artists and writers responded with varying degrees of seriousness, with some "using the cookbook as a canvas for wit and creative deviation." Of the cookbook's 150 contributors, 61 were novelists, 55 were painters, 19 were poets, and 15 were sculptors.

William Styron provided a six-page recipe for Southern fried chicken, a dish he describes as the "most put-upon, abused and generally misunderstood of all indigenous American culinary triumphs." Man Ray's contribution was a "Menu for a Dadaist Day" that includes ball bearings and children's blocks.

Included are recipes from (among others): Pearl Buck, Erskine Caldwell, Isak Dinesen, Robert Graves, Lillian Hellman, Harper Lee, James Michener, Marianne Moore, and Katherine Anne Porter.