Having Guests Bring Food

I remember the church pot lucks from my youth. Everyone brought their favorite dish to share with others. Our family always uses the “pot luck” concept for family get togethers. Does anyone have any experience with getting party guests involved by bringing food dishes to the party? If so, how do you announce the plan to the guests and how do you make sure you don’t end up with 15 bowls of spinich dip or 15 bags of chips?

One way to do it is to assign people categories. Don’t tell them specifically what to bring, but request fruit salad from 2-3 people, vegetable dish from 2-3 people, dessert from 2-3 people, etc. This way, you get a variety of options. Just let them know their “assignment” when they RSVP.

You could also just write in the invitation to “RSVP with the side dish or dessert you plan to bring.” This way, you can let someone else know if their dish is all ready “spoken for” when they RSVP.

Great idea about the “RSVP with the side dish or desert you plan to bring.” It gets them thinking before the RSVP conversation—keeps me from having to contact them again after they RSVP! Now, as long as they don’t all email their RSVP at the same time, leaving me with ten identical side dishes!

This is an interesting thing because it seems to depend on where you are located/your upbringing… When I lived in the Midwest, it was much more common to expect to bring something, while on the coasts I’ve found it is less expected. I don’t mind bringing a contribution, but I have met some people who think it is “odd” to invite someone to a party, but then ask them to supply something for it.

Either way, I think it is almost universally considered “rude” to ask for a very specific thing (unless you can do it very charmingly like “oh, we all love your cheesy potatoes, would you consider bringing those to the party for everyone to enjoy?”). I have one relative who is often “ordered” by other relatives to bring specific dishes - usually things she doesn’t even eat or care for personally.

I DO think asking for a specific category is lovely IF they offer- (ie, salad, side dish, dessert) especially if you let people know a general theme or what the main dish will be. (“I’ll be making a beef roast and an assortment of grilled vegetables - would you care to bring a side dish to complement that?”)

I also try to offer things that are easy and require no preparation such as wine or bread/rolls since I don’t expect someone to spend a lot of time making something for my party…

Ann makes a good point. You don’t want your guests to think they are coming to a regular dinner party and then offend them by asking them to bring a dish when they call you to respond or get to the bottom of the invite.

To counter this, I’d make sure you “advertise” the fact that this is a potluck party. Usually I see this done in the invitations, with the name of the party including the word potluck somewhere. For example “Join us for a 4th of July Potluck BBQ” or “Sunny Lane Neighborhood Potluck Party” are good ways to get it out right away. Sometimes it’s mentioned in the verse, too, like “Spring is in the air, so bring a dish for all to share.”

Since most people are familiar with the concept of a potluck, they shouldn’t be surprised when they RSVP “yes” to a potluck party and you ask what they plan to bring. HTH!

Ann, I agree that it’s largely regional or cultural. My husband is Egyptian, and he finds the whole potluck idea very odd. In fact, I’ve found that most of his friends find it offensive for anyone to even offer to bring something. In my family, every gathering is potluck. After all these years, the hubby still shakes his head when he sees me taking food to someone else’s house!

In our social group, the only time things are potluck is if it’s a specific group’s activity versus one person having a party. For example, our homeschool group has potluck parties and our co-op has potluck meetings, but a personal dinner party is usually not potluck.

Either way, it’s important to be clear from the beginning so no one is embarrassed or caught off guard.

Somehow, it seems that potlucks always just seem to work out. I usually set a theme and prepare the main dish, and tell the others that they can can bring along anything that goes well with it. Even though I know there’s a risk that everyone will bring the same thing, it just never seems to happen. When you give people a choice, rather than dictating what each person should bring, it seems that a few really interesting dishes show up that turn out to be a “hit”!

We just attended a potluck reunion on my husband’s side yesterday. It was kinda funny—the hosts wanted to know what everyone was bringing and no one replied—we ended up with only 1 “duplicate” dish, and it was the main ingredient, not the entire dish (strawberry pie and strawberry cream cheese pretzel dessert). So Mary is right—they often tend to work out on their own. And the biggest hit of the day? The low fat, healthy spinach/egg/cheese casserole! Go figure!

We tried an “unplanned” potluck once with my family. Three out of four families brought Grandma’s baked bean recipe! Wow, did we ever have a lot of baked beans!   The interesting thing that was every pot of beans tasted different! Ever since our “big bean party” we’ve started assigning a category and then letting each family group decide what they want to bring from that category. This seems to work well with my family.

Ann’s comment above about the family member who is “required” to make certain dishes regardless of what she would really like to eat made me think.  My sister-in-law always makes ham rollups for family gatherings, and I believe she makes them because she likes them.  There’s certainly an element of expectation there, though.  Is there a polite way to get out of making the dish you’re “expected” to make for parties when your heart just isn’t into it?

Potluck is always good for the economy. Sharing is fun. Plus it provides variety.

I agree with that…It provides variety..It has the good economy.

Regards

Turner

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