Entrées: A Collection of Recipes

It is clear that the author of this cookbook—whose initials are F.I.—was a member of the Jewish community of Tunis and was probably involved in the tight-knit world of local Judeo-Arabic publishing there. A possible candidate is Eli‘ezer (Lazzero) Farḥi (1851–1930), a noted Livornese Tunisian writer and journalist who published widely in Judeo-Arabic, under both his own name and various pseudonyms. The publisher of the cookbook, Jacob Guedj, trained as a printer in Algiers, and then opened his own press, producing works of Hebrew liturgy and popular Judeo-Arabic literature. In 1895, Guedj moved back to Tunis and reopened his press there, continuing to print until the mid-twentieth century.