CLM Hen House

CApastorswife · Joined: 15 Apr 2026 Posts: 30 Location: Southern California

Do any of you do themed potlucks (i.e. western, Hawaiian), or have you done them in the past? How have they worked? Some of the ladies at our church want to try doing this, but I wanted to get some feedback first... Question

Liz

amyjoyousone · Joined: 29 May 2025 Posts: 52

Themed potlucks can be lots of fun! We have members in our church from all over the world - Philippines, Hawaii, Indonesia, India, Holland, Spain, Cuba, Greece (I hope I didn't leave any one out...) And we've had a couple of "International" dinners - where everyone brings a dish that is traditional in their culture. We always have a GREAT variety of wonderful food. I always make sure someone brings American dishes, too. We did this for a dessert social during the holidays - everyone brought traditional Christmas cookies or desserts and the recipes - it was a hit! During our missions emphasis month one year we did a dinner highlighting foods from places we have missionaries serving, I put up pics amd bios of the missionaries.
We've also done themes around a kind of dish, cassaroles or soups or pasta dishes.
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Rejoice in the Lord always, and again I say, rejoice! Philippians 4:4

siscosmom · Joined: 21 Mar 2026 Posts: 206 Location: West Virginia

We've done a soup and sandwich night and a chili cook-off night, where we made our favorite chili recipi along with grilled cheese or peanut butter sandwiches. One very thoughtful lady made chicken noodle soup for those whose systems couldn't handle all that chili!

We're planning to have an international dinner and have everyone bring a dish from each country represented by our missionaries. That should be really interesting.

In the summer, a cool salad theme is nice. You can have tuna salad or ham salad sandwiches, Greek or tossed salal as a main course, and fruit salad for desert.

barbozar · Joined: 24 Jun 2025 Posts: 17 Location: Newark, Ohio

A popular VBS theme this summer is Fiesta, so a Mexican potluck could be a good way to kick off (or wrap up) your week! I am a Spanish teacher, so I provided a lot of decorations. The Mexican flag is red, white, and green, so I covered the tables in those colors. A few weeks ahead I put out a couple of cookbooks in the foyer that people could look through for ideas and put copies of recipes in a basket beside the books so that they could take what appealed to them. There was a big sign over the books announcing our "Fiesta" along with date and time. We had a very FESTIVE time! I even had a piñata for the kids and one for the adults...and of course, Mexican music was playing. We also have done Hawaiian Night, Western Night, and Italian Night. The key was getting people involved and pumped up ahead of time. What good fellowship!
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Bless you!

sharon davis · Joined: 14 Mar 2026 Posts: 72 Location: Portsmouth, Ohio

Can you give me some details about Hawaiian night? Thanks
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If one falls down, his friend can help him up...Ecclesiastes 4:10

barbozar · Joined: 24 Jun 2025 Posts: 17 Location: Newark, Ohio

Well, here it goes: we had piña colada cake decorated with palm tree toothpicks and mandarin orange "flowers" with maraschino cherry centers. For drinks, we had guava punch with an ice mold made of pineapple juice with pineapple slices and maraschino cherry centers. We also had blender drinks, but that was hard to keep up with. We had a hula dance and hula hoop contests by age groups and even an "elder off". Hawaiian music was playing. We advertised ahead of time and people dressed accordingly. We had sunglasses, a beach towel, and sunscreen as the prizes. Kids met people at the doors with leis and felt QUITE important, thank you very much! Hawaiian food has a lot of Chinese influence, so we included egg rolls among the food. Does that help? For other Hawaiian ideas, I wrote about a birthday party that we gave a friend when she turned 50. Hope this helps you have a great time! I was just looking at some other strands earlier and noticed one titled "Hallelujah Luau". That could be such a fun title to use, I think!
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Bless you!