It’s always nice to be invited to dinner by a friend.
Generally speaking, it’s common courtesy to bring something, be it a bottle of wine or maybe a dessert.
If this is a potluck-style dinner, bringing a dish is expected.
Most of the time, however, guests are expected to come over and enjoy some food and company.
Most of the time.
Redditor cimorene_faye was recently invited over for dinner at a friend’s house.
When the original poster (OP) asked if they could bring anything, her host had two suggestions.
One was to be expected, the other, however, felt someone on the “distasteful” side of the OP.
Wondering if they were wrong for feeling this way, the OP took to the subReddit “Am I The A**hole” (AITA), where they asked fellow Redditors:
“AITA for finding it distasteful that the dinner host asked to split the cost of groceries/ingredients?”
The OP explained why she found herself somewhat perplexed by a recent dinner invitation:
“My friend recently moved into a new apartment and invited me to dinner this weekend because she’s craving dry pot.”
“For those of you who don’t know, dry pot is a stir-fried medley of veggies/meat all mixed up with a bunch of fancy spices like star anise and cardamom.”
“It was a cute idea and my first time visiting hers for dinner, so I accepted and asked if it’d make sense for me to cook something too (it’s a small kitchen).”
“Here’s where I personally thought it got weird – she suggested I bring a bottle of wine, and then casually mentioned that she’d like me to pitch in for the cost of ingredients and spices.”
“Now, neither of us is strapped for cash.”
“We both live in a [high cost of living] city but have very good jobs and financial stability.”
“I’ve also hosted this friend before plenty of times at my own apartment – not for dinner, but for cocktails.”
“I worked as a bartender a few years ago and since then have accumulated my own bar setup at home (20+ bottles of liquors and bitters, home-made syrups and infusions, clear glass molds, cute glassware, the works).”
“That was maybe 7+ years ago, and since then, my place has become a go-to place among my circle of friends for an occasional pre-dinner drink, and it’s really fun creating special cocktails that people will enjoy.”
“I’ve never asked anyone for a single cent, nor did I feel like that would be the right thing to do given that I was the one hosting.”
“I felt like given this context, it was kind of odd for her to ask me to pitch in for $ given that it’s never come up before and I know her financial situation.”
“But she got upset at my pushback and her rationale is that dry pot is expensive to make and that she’d be the one doing the cooking and cleanup.”
“As of the time of this post, she’s spent nearly $40 on specialty spices, and she’s still got to get another $100+ worth of ‘imported and specialty’ groceries (from H-Mart lmao).”
“Apparently this dry pot is also going to make 5-6 servings, which I feel like is even more odd because 1.”
“I was just planning to be there for dinner and wasn’t counting on leftovers 2. you can control how much you cook at one time, so you don’t HAVE to make that much food in one go if you don’t want to.”
“My take is that if you’re offering to host and cook dinner, buying the food and putting in the time to cook is part of being a good host!”
“Her PoV is that my making drinks for her throughout the years isn’t equivalent to cooking a full dinner, and that it’s very normal to ask someone to pitch in for the cost of food, and that if I’d asked her to pitch in for liquor at any time she would’ve happily done so.”
“At that point, though, I don’t know why we wouldn’t just go to a restaurant and split the bill, because that’d basically be the same thing.”
“So Reddit – AITA for being disgruntled at being asked to split the cost of the groceries + some of the spices?”
Fellow Redditors weighed in on where they believed the OP fell in this particular situation, by declaring:
- NTA – Not The A**hole
- YTA – You’re The A**hole
- NAH – No A**holes Here
- ESH – Everyone Sucks Here
The Reddit community overwhelmingly agreed that the OP was not the a**hole for being put off to ask to contribute to their friend’s groceries.
Everyone agreed that if the OP’s friend wanted her groceries partially covered, that should have been the first thing she said, with others feeling that the OP’s friend was simply looking for someone to offset the cost of her pantry.
“NTA just decline the invitation and don’t have her for cocktails anymore.”- Catlover9382
“NTA.”
“This is such a bizarre setup and is so inconsiderate to you.”
“If the plan was to split the cost of ingredients evenly between you two, that should have been the first thing she brought up.”
“And if that’s the case, you need to have equal say in how much gets spent and on what.”
“Especially if it’s just you two, there’s no reason that dinner should cost ~$200 in ingredients.”
“My personal policy is that if I’m inviting friends to dinner, I am willingly taking on that cost as host.”
“Sometimes I’ll ask or my friends will offer to bring something, like a side/app/dessert, but charging your guests is abrasive, especially if they get little to no say in what gets bought and cooked.”-kokoromelody
“NTA.”
“She’s filling up her spice rack and pantry and wants you to foot the bill!”
“I’d bow out gracefully and say let’s just get a drink out instead.”
“Let someone else be the sucker.”- RadDrMom
“NTA.”
“She wants you to help stock her spice cabinet.”
“And I mean H-Mart can get pricy sometimes, but geez, if you have an H-Mart near you you should have an actual Chinese market.”
“None of the spices you listed should be that expensive. “
“Or just go out to get dry pot.”- chooseusermochi
“NTA.”
“Your offer to bring a dish was sufficient.”
“She’s asking you to split the cost of her pantry.”
“$40 in spices for a single dish is wild.”- no_good_namez
“It’s called hospitality.”
“In nearly every culture on earth, what she did would be considered shameful.”
“A host offers hospitality and a guest offers gratitude and pleasant behavior.”
“NTA.”- HappySummerBreeze
“NTA.”
“If you’re going to split the cost, at the end of the night, you should be able to take 1/2 of everything—leftovers, unused spices, unused vegetables, unused meats—home with you.”- Nashiker2020
“NTA.”
“What even is in this dish?”
“I mean, I know – tariffs, inflation, and all that, but is she buying individual strands of hand-picked saffron for $20 each or something?”- cluster_bd
“100% NTA. Is your friend cooking a mala dry pot (Ma La Xiang Guo)?”
“One can get many types of ingredients, and unless she buys fresh seafood like lobster and abalone, I can’t see how it would cost $200 for 5-6 servings.”
“She can make sliced beef and veggies for $50 ($30 for a few pounds of beef and $20 for 5-6 different types of tofu and veggies).”
“The sauce is a hot pot base plus fermented bean paste (doubanchang), all of which are used regularly in Sichuan cooking and don’t cost $100 for one meal.”
“If you decide to chip in, make sure you ask to see the receipt(s).”
“You might be funding her kitchen set up – a nice carbon steel wok perhaps?”- GrassRunner29
“NTA – A host never ever asks their guest to kick in their share.”
“She invited you.”
“She would cover the expense.”
“Next time it would be your turn.”
“Presumably she will keep the leftovers AND she’ll have spices that will last her MONTHS.”
“She’s an a-hole.”
“If she wants your company, she can make something cheap.”
“She can make the dish she’s craving for herself, and enjoy it by herself.”- Dry_Employer_9747
“NTA.”
“Your friend can ask, and you can decline.”
“She shouldn’t start buying stuff before you say yes to sharing, that’s on her.”- Nervous_Cry_7905
There were some, however, who at least understood where the OP’s friend was coming from, even though they still didn’t think the OP should be expected to cover the costs:
“I’ve never been asked to contribute to the cost of a meal in a typical ‘dinner at a friend’s house’ situation.”
“Having said that, I’m reasonably certain that none of my friends have ever spent $200 making a meal for two.”
“This is just ‘out there’ enough that I’ll say NAH – they aren’t totally out of line for asking, and you aren’t totally out of line for refusing.”- wesmorgan1
Some dishes result in higher grocery bills than others.
If that’s the case, the OP’s friend should have been transparent about it from the beginning and presented it as more of a joint venture than an invitation to come over for dinner.
An invitation the OP likely won’t be accepting from this particular friend anymore.