What I also consider rude is people showing up extremely late for a meal. I once invited friends to lunch at my place at noon. They asked if I could make it 11:30 as they had someone else to meet after lunch. I agreed, and timed the food so it would be ready at 11:30. They showed up at 1pm, by which time the frittata was shriveled. I was not amused.
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I have one couple who inevitably shows up early! It used to agitate me a little; now I realize Iâm lucky âŚ
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Critiques and comparisons of food among declared food lovers meeting for the purpose of sharing / discussing food doesnât fall into âpissing contestâ imo.
I think I went to only one or two meetups in the chowhound days (work travel, not lack of interest) but the analysis / conversation may indeed have been harsher than that at our string of recent nyc HO group meals (which I attributed to the purported need to find the hidden/best/etc on chowhound where the discussions often got very heated even about something like is this cabdriver joint better than that one, and is the one in westchester that almost no one from the city will get to declared better than all others simply because who has the point of reference to argue otherwise).
But I think you may have been alluding more to personalities than to the discussion.
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My room mate and I were once reduced to making cocktails of just Tang powder, water and gin.
It was so absurd we christened the drink the Chocolate Vodka Icy.
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Defined!
I can relate. We drank vodka and Crystal Light.
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Unfortunately, Iâve concluded the contrary happens with some frequency. Unsolicited one-upmanship really should be verboten in the host/guest situations, IMO. Nothing good can come of it.
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Strawberry daiquiris made with Albertsonâs brand strawberry jam, frozen store brand limeade, and white rum from a plastic bottle (just $9 for a handle back in the 80s)
They were deplorable even then , but by the 2nd one you didnt care, and was all we could afford
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And, I bet, a good time was had by all.
My career as a winemaker started at age 10, when I mashed some plums in a bucket with the end of a baseball bat, and somehow managed to get the juicy pulp into a few screwcap Rhine bottles. Almost all detonated before I turned 11, but the few that didnât werenât poison.
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Precocious 
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Oh yes, a good time.
That cluster of friends in college was particularly resourceful.
If we hadnât gotten paid (usually the last weekend of thr month because rent) weâd all go through sofas, ashtrays, and pockets for whatever money we had left. Then through the kitchen for whatever was left.
Wed make a stone soup of all of the random food (and sometimes it was actually good) then make a pitcher of those awful daiquiris.
That I know of, we produced a decorated Air Force colonel and an MBA, so we did ok.
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Agree on host/guest situations, but I was responding to the comment about Chowhound meetups.
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From 2009-2016, about 80 percent of the Chowhound meetups I attended were Chowhound Home Cooking Meet-ups or dinner parties at my home or other Chowhoundsâ homes. We were doing one or 2 meetups a month for several years! Some of us morphed into regular friends, but there was absolutely an element of judging and comparison and side eyes any time we had Cookie Day, Waffle Day, Cake Day, Dumpling Day, Pie Day, Cookie Exchanges, Potlucks, Picnics, etc.
When there were Chowhound Restaurant Meet-ups or Gelato Tastings, it was more comparing Restaurant X to Y, Pistachio Gelato A to Pistachio Gelato B, and much less personal!
