Southern Lady Code: Essays(21)

“You made this!” she’ll say.

What she means is: You’re a miracle worker.

Grin as she peer-pressures other guests to try the log. Everybody’s doing it! And why not? It’s fun to do something you’re not so sure you should do. It gives you a rush. Like streaking through a Best Buy.

Onion dip is not as exhilarating, but stir one packet into a sixteen-ounce tub of sour cream and you’ve got yourself a crowd pleaser. No, you can’t substitute low-fat sour cream because it most certainly does not taste the same. No, store-bought dip-in-a-jar doesn’t taste the same either. One tastes like a dirty dollar bill and the other tastes like a waste of money. Full-fat is the only way to go. It’s a Christmas party, not a funeral reception. Fine, fine, you can also serve it at a funeral reception. But either way, serve with Ruffles because nobody wants to dip celery sticks.

The only thing simpler is mail-order ham. Mail-order exists because it saves time, energy, and tastes exactly like the ham you ordered last year. Mine comes from South Texas. It’s hickory-smoked and spiral-sliced. It’s six to seven pounds. It’s fuchsia-pink and it glistens. It’s irresistible. A few sheets to the wind, someone will cradle it like a baby.

Speaking of babies, some hostesses think Nutter Butter snowmen are only for kids’ parties. They are not. First of all: Peanut allergies. One face full of hives and your party is over. And, honestly, the work put into these showstoppers makes them too good for kids.

What you do is: Submerge a Nutter Butter in white chocolate. Add mini chocolate chips for coal eyes, orange gel icing for a carrot nose, mini M&M’s for coat buttons, and pretzel sticks for arms. Cool on wax paper. Repeat until your apron is more splattered than a Jackson Pollock. Trust me, there will be more Nutter Butter snowmen Instagrams than selfies.

See, I’ve learned that no matter where they’re from or how old they are, people like food that’s fun. They like to be daring. They like to eat art. And they like to party like it’s 1979 at holiday time.

“Give your guests what they want,” Grandmother said.

That’s Southern Lady Code for: There’s nothing less fun than caviar on toast points.





HOW TO BE THE


            BEST GUEST





Everyone appreciates a hostess with the mostest, but a hostess with the mostest appreciates the Best Guest.

The Best Guest arrives on time and, from the moment she walks through the front door, spews compliments like a sprinkler.

She says, “Oh my word, look at the dining room table! That centerpiece looks like something out of Barbra Streisand’s wet dream! Did you bedazzle those two dozen pinecones yourself? You did! Did you take a class for that? You didn’t! You could have your own craft show. And, just so you know: your outfit is everything.”

The Best Guest does not then hand off a bottle of wine like a relay baton because the hostess has already taken great pains to pick wine for the night. Nor, for the same reason, does she push her homemade cookies.

She has already sent flowers that morning. She spends as much as she would spend on a nice supper. Yes, including alcohol and tax.

No, the hostess’s party will not look like a botanical garden. It will look like a liquor mart or school bake sale because not everyone behaves like the Best Guest.

The Best Guest eats what she is given. If an hors d’oeuvre is on a toothpick, she does not sniff it suspiciously like baby-laxative-cut cocaine. She sucks that toothpick clean. And then she asks for seconds.

The Best Guest does not question canapés. She gets a cheese log rolling. She brags to latecomers, “That mango chutney cheddar used to be shaped like Donald Trump!”

She brags about the mini quiches: “I’ve eaten eight and slipped one in my purse.”

The Best Guest goes where the hostess directs her. She does not dawdle. With the speed and enthusiasm of a game of musical chairs, she sits where her place card instructs her to sit.

She exclaims to the hostess, “Your handwriting looks like something off of Downton Abbey. Did you take a calligraphy course? You didn’t! You could make a fortune addressing wedding invitations. Oh my word, that ham looks like it was glazed by angels!”

The Best Guest then makes conversation with the worst guest, who is talking to no one. The worst guest has been invited because he is married to someone or is somebody’s boss or does somebody’s taxes. Nobody likes the worst guest because he finds eye contact challenging. He eats hunched over the hostess’s wedding china as if it’s a trough.

The Best Guest asks the socially awkward accountant, “What’s the sexiest of tax forms? Yes, I’m talking to you. You must have an opinion. The FBAR Form 114! Please, do go on!”

And then she leans in and hangs on his every word as if he’s Brad Pitt talking about how he made love to Geena Davis in Thelma and Louise.

After supper, the Best Guest does not challenge the hostess. When the hostess says she doesn’t want help clearing the table, the Best Guest doesn’t lift a finger. When the hostess asks that everyone move into the living room for games, the Best Guest takes the worst guest by the arm and leads the parade.

The Best Guest picks the worst guest as her charades partner. When she pantomimes talking on a phone for—TV show, three words; second word, one syllable—Better Call Saul, she isn’t a bad sport when the worst guest guesses: “Brain Tumor! Hair extensions! Oh, one syllable. EAR!”