Food For Friends - Eating and Drinking at the Board Game Table

KingPut wrote: I learned most of my social skills and hospitality from my Italian mother. If you come to my game night you better be prepared to eat and drink. Typically I start game night between 1:00 pm and 4:00 pm. I usually make sausages or meatballs and some kind of pasta dish. Or maybe I'll switch it up and make Beef Stew or Jambalaya. We'll play the first round of games in the afternoon and then break for dinner around 6:00 pm before starting the evening gaming. Dinner isn't eaten during gaming. It is eaten away from the games. It's a time for us to socialize and interact with out cardboard in front of us. It's a time to get to know each other outside of the games we play.

That's awesome. I should do something like that the next time I have the relatives over. Game early, break for burgers/dogs/taco bar, and reconvene after supper.

Grilling works well for spring / summer game afternoon-nights.

Three years ago, I tried to host a combination board game/grilling thing. I have plenty of grilling experience, plus a perfectly good croquet set gathering dust. But one of our players brought a board game (Relic) that turned into an all day slog, and we finally agreed to just quit after nearly five hours of play. I set up the grill and bring out the burgers and brats, only to find that one person is a vegetarian and also won't allow her husband to eat meat either. And they need to leave earlier than our end time, but can maybe fit in a short game. So nobody plays croquet, and they all stand around the grill impatiently. I rush putting the food on, which leads to some slightly crispy results. And quite a bit of the food ended up going to the freezer. The married couple left just after we finished eating.

KingPut wrote: Grilling works well for spring / summer game afternoon-nights.

Wrong. There is no "season" for grilling - it is a year round activity. Hell I dug a friends grill out of 18" of snow awhile back to grill 10 steaks I brought to a gaming weekend. Beats using a fucking broiler.

Msample wrote:

KingPut wrote: Grilling works well for spring / summer game afternoon-nights.

Wrong. There is no "season" for grilling - it is a year round activity. Hell I dug a friends grill out of 18" of snow awhile back to grill 10 steaks I brought to a gaming weekend. Beats using a fucking broiler.

I once successfully grilled burgers in subzero weather. The trick is not waiting until the flames die down into coals. You need to cook over active flame to get enough heat to cook the meat.

Again, it's great to see so much variety in opinion as to whether food and drink are appropriate at the game or not. Thank you.