Cohousing-L Mailing List: RE: potlucks vs. common meals

[Ruddick, T.R. (RUDDICK]

>Hey all-

>Grace here after many months of hiatus...  Question: I'm not sure I 
>understand why a meal cooked by a sub-set of people (common meal) is 
>preferable to a pot-luck.  What are folk's opinion on this? 

Adding to the other good comments:

Potlucks, I have observed, always involve everyone cooking enough food for
everyone.  At a potluck for 50 people with perhaps 25 different households
involved, if each household brings a dish, there's usually enough food for
at least 200 people.  Lots and lots of leftovers.

Also at a potluck the cuisine is not necessarily varied or healthful.  Once
in a while that's fine (those breakfast for dinner fifth fridays that
someone described sound delightful!) but if done frequently it could be a
problem...

Of course, there are ways to try to cut down on overfeeding and
duplication...encourage each person to cook only enough for 5 people (but
then the first people thru the line wipe out the most yummy stuff, leaving
the soy sauce spongecake for those at the end) and having people assigned to
salads, sides, entrees, etc. (but then all the salad people bring pasta
primavera, all the sides are baked beans, all the entrees are Colonel
Sanders...).

Well, maybe potlucks are different where you live.
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