Real Simple reader, Liza Garcia, 26; Brooklyn, New York
"When it comes to food, I'm a risk taker, so I love potlucks. I'm the one who eats all the weird stuff no one else wants. I love the idea of bringing stuff together that doesn't make any sense. But I do think it's important to stay seasonal. I don't want to eat a shepherd's pie in the summer, and I don't think anyone else does, either. You need to know who you're feeding. Once I made this delicious potato-leek soup, and at the end of the night I realized I was the only one who had touched it. Turned out, everyone there was a vegetarian and couldn't eat my soup because I had used chicken stock. The host had neglected to tell me about this, and it had never occurred to me to ask."