The Back Bench

It’s a tired old joke that we Mormons eat a lot of green Jell-O salad. We don’t, really — not anymore, anyway — but that’s the joke.

Oh sure, there may be a few of us who eat Jell-O in private every now and again, but rarely will you see a platter of it at ward potluck dinners. That’s because someone’s bound to make a joke of it. And none of us want to be the subject of any joke, especially not at potluck dinners. We want our food to be liked. And we want it to be eaten.

If you’re like me, you can’t help but take your dish’s performance a little personally. Say, for example, no one eats my wife’s green bean casserole. Well I take that as an attack on my family

Oh, we’re not good enough for you, are we?

However, if the casserole is gone by the time I reach it, I’ll make a point of telling everyone my wife made it and I’ll respect them all for having such good taste.

Silly, I know. But somehow the ward potluck dinner has evolved from a meal into a showcase. Folks don’t bring just anything; they bring the best they have to offer.

No one will admit to this, of course. We all claim that our dishes are mere trifles, the simplest thing we could throw together at the moment, the very least of our normally marvelous culinary exploits.

Women sometimes do the same thing with clothes. “Oh this old thing?” they’ll say. “Why I’ve had this hanging in my closet for years. I never thought to actually wear it.”

Nonsense. We all slave in the kitchen to prepare our dishes.

Well, I shouldn’t say “all.” Not everyone is as devoted. You’ll always have at least one plate of store-bought doughnuts. But overall, most people try extra hard to make their dishes great.

Don’t think for an instant, though, that great cooking is the only ingredient to success. If you want your dish consumed, you’ve got to play the game and you’ve got to play smart.

Location Location Location

Most wards use those long folding tables to hold the food. When it’s time to eat, lines of people form on both sides of the table.

If you want your dish to do well, place it in the center of the table where both sides of traffic will have access to it. If you put it on the edge of the table, the opposite side will be reluctant to reach across the food and scoop themselves a portion.

And speaking of scoops, put two serving spoons with your food instead of one. People will often pass over food simply because a serving spoon isn’t immediately available. Don’t lose those precious few because of lack of silverware.

You have to be careful though. The people organizing the meal will try to steal one of your serving spoons and place it with a dish that doesn’t have one. If that happens, steal it back. Remember, this is war.

Choose your dish wisely

My wife hates mayonnaise. She abhors the stuff, in fact. Simply mention the word and her face tightens in such a display of disgust that it nearly caves in on itself.

This becomes extremely problematic when we go to potluck dinners. It seems that half of the food there is made of mayonnaise: potato salad, pasta salad, tuna salad, ham salad, acorn salad, pretty much anything that ends in salad.

My wife won’t touch any of it. In fact, give her a ten-foot pole and she’ll beat you with it before she puts it anywhere near the mayonnaise.

She’s not alone. I know quite a few people who hate mayonnaise. Or nuts. Or cilantro. Or curry. Or whatever.

When choosing which dish to prepare, avoid the often unpopular ingredients. They’ll only minimize your audience. Instead, think globally. Prepare those dishes that everyone likes.

This obviously means that you should avoid dishes no one can identify.

It’s fun to be exotic, yes. But it’s also dangerous. Most people don’t like experimenting with food. And even if they do, they won’t take much of it for fear they might not like it. And, even if they do like it, by the time they’ve finished everything else, they’ll be too full to go back for seconds.

Your goal is to make something that everyone knows they want just by looking at it. You want them fighting over the spoon. And once they have the spoon, you want them to be incredibly selfish, scooping themselves massive portions with little regard to anyone else.

Know Your Competition

Direct competition can be a problem. If someone has made a dish similar to yours you’ll end up sharing the same audience. Both of you will suffer.

The obvious solution is to move your dish closer to the front of the line so that people see it and dip from it first. But that’s a little tacky.

Your best bet is to study the playing field well before the dinner begins. Know who’s famous for making what. And if you see an untapped niche, go for it.

Eat Your Own

Position yourself toward the front of the line. When you get to your own dish, scoop yourself a big portion. People will notice your eagerness, suspect you know something they don’t, and follow suit.

This initiates a chain reaction because as more people scoop from the dish, it becomes increasingly more enticing to the next guy. Suddenly it’s a popular choice.

Sneaky, you say? Of course it is. But that’s what separates the great potluckers from those who leave with leftovers. They cook well and they sell well. They understand more than anyone that old adage, “You are what you bring to eat.”

Pass the Jell-O.

If you were to stand at any pulpit in this church and throw a rock into the congregation, chances are you’d hit at least three great singers.

Chances are also good that you’d be escorted from the building, but my point is this: we’re up to our ears in great singers.

This isn’t a bad thing of course. It’s wonderful. Great singing gives spiritual fulfillment even when everything else goes flat.

Say, for example, you’ve got a notoriously boring high councilman coming. No problem. Just ask Sister So-and-So to sing a little ditty before the high councilman speaks and everyone will conclude the meeting was a smashing success. You can’t go wrong with great singing.

Or can you?

There’s a danger, I believe, in having too much of a good thing. Recently our ward choir sang a rest hymn during Sacrament meeting. It wasn’t the best performance. I’m no singer myself, so I couldn’t tell you if they were flat or sharp or merely suffering from chest colds. But they were definitely off.

That wasn’t the real problem though.

The real problem didn’t surface until after the singing was over. Once the choir sat down I turned to my wife and rolled my eyes – as if to say, “That was painful.”

My wife gave me a shame-on-you look, and it was then that I realized the real problem was me. I had become a singing snob. I had been so exposed to great singing that somehow I had convinced myself that anything less than great was not worth listening to.

It’s an easy trap to fall into. Frankly, I blame the Mormon Tabernacle Choir. Their singing is so marvelous and we hear them so often that it’s easy to become accustomed to their level of performance.

Instead of being the pinnacle, they become the norm. Instead of being the exception, they become the rule.

But whether we have a true scapegoat or not, singing snobbery can be a tough nut to crack. It has many forms: whispering in the foyer about how the special musical number was anything but special, avoiding eye contact with the singer for fear he or she will know you find their voice distasteful, or worst of all – the Grand Pooh-Bah of singing snobbery – refusing to sing with the ward choir because they don’t sound great.

Oh the inhumanity.

Maybe this is a new phenomenon to you and I’m the only bad apple in the tree. Or maybe you feel just a hint of guilt. Either way, what I’ve learned since then may prove useful.

I’ve been watching the non-snobs, paying attention to how they act when the singing isn’t great. Those have been rare moments. The singing is usually marvelous.

But in both cases, the non-snobs acted the same way. Their behavior and attitude didn’t change. It’s not that they genuinely enjoyed good singing and only pretended to enjoy bad singing. They genuinely enjoyed both.

That’s because to a non-snob there is no bad singing. Oh sure they recognize great talent when they hear it, but they also accept every song for it what it was meant to be: a form of worship, an expression of praise.

So I made a list. These are the four things every non-snob does regardless of the music or the circumstance.

1. Listen

The hymnal says it best. In its preface the First Presidency wrote, “Some of the greatest sermons are preached by the singing of hymns. Hymns move us to repentance and good works, build testimony and faith, comfort the weary, console the mourning, and inspire us to endure to the end.”

In my moment of singing snobbery I had completely forgotten that. I had turned a deaf ear to the hymn’s sermon. I was so unimpressed with the performance of the singers that I failed to pay attention to that which mattered most: the doctrine of the hymn and the spirit of the Lord who confirms that doctrine. Non-snobs listen.

2 .Smile

Nothing motivates a performer more than knowing their performance is appreciated. Non-snobs smile at the singer. They show teeth. They let the performer know that their voice brings them joy.

If the performer sees them smiling, they smile back. Sometimes they even sing better. And even if they don’t they at least know they did some good. What’s more, seeing a happy face relaxes a singer and puts much of their nervousness to rest.

3. Say Thanks

Non-snobs take time after meetings to shake the singers’ hands and express gratitude for their performance. They don’t lie or exaggerate. They’re sincere. They tell them they appreciate their talent and leave it at that.

If you’re ever been on the receiving end of such praise, you know how priceless it truly is.

4. Sing

Whether they have a voice or not, non-snobs sing. If they enjoy singing, they join the choir, regardless of the talent currently found therein.

I got to go to General Conference a few weeks ago. It was my first time inside the Conference Center. It’s huge. You could park the Titanic in that place. Twice.

The most memorable moment of my experience however – even more memorable than seeing the prophet – was standing and singing with all those people. It was incredible. There were thousands of us, all lifting our voices in unison. I couldn’t help but feel a little indestructible. It was incredibly invigorating.

That’s what non-snobs always feel, whether it’s ten thousand voices or just one. They know the true power of the hymns. And even if they’re just listening, they do it with a lot of heart because, unlike singing snobs, they understand who we’re singing to.