“Everything was delicious”

is so bad that you need to liven it up by talking about recipes. Although I don’t think this would actually reduce the boredom. I enjoy cooking, but few things are more boring than hearing a recipe in detail when you can’t even write it down.

Still, I definitely recommend asking for a recipe. And if you’re asking for a recipe, you don’t have to worry that they’ll wonder why you didn’t ask for the recipe for everything. There’s only so much you can hold in your head. And you really can’t ask for every single recipe anyway, or you’d be asked to leave. “What, are you opening a restaurant?”

Of course, it is always possible that the host might not take the request the wrong way. They might take it to mean that you are sitting there, thinking, “This is a good kugel. I want to make this kugel at home so that I could eat it without ever having to go to these people’s house again. No offense.”

But at least they know you like the food. And you have a good recipe. But then other people might ask you for the recipe when they come to you for Shabbat, and you don’t want it getting around that much. After all, you want people to want to come to your place for a special Shabbat meal that isn’t like everyone else’s

Since “Everything was delicious,” is just the code to get out of the house, you might someday need a way to believably compliment the food. You can try taking seconds. And then the hosts will think, “Oh! He really likes that!” although they might think, “Boy, did he not eat yesterday?”

So what some people do if they want to compliment the host -- and what I started doing -- is I pick one specific food that I liked and ask about it: “Can I have the recipe for the kugel? You have to send me the recipe.” Of course, that might sound like you are actually saying, “You had me over, you introduced me to this kugel, and now you have a social obligation to tell me how to make it.”

But still, it is a sincere compliment unless it is brought up because the conversation

So what I like to do is, when I’m telling someone who asks for a recipe, I leave out one key step or ingredient. That way, their guests can taste it and think, “It tastes okay,” and the hosts will go, “I don’t know what’s wrong with it. It was so good when we ate it at the Schmutters’ house.” And then they mention my name.

And then their guests will be like, “Let’s go to the Schmutters’ house.”

And then they will all invite us back to their house for reciprocity. And we will get a great Shabbat meal, and the family will get a little vacation. Unless they are all following the wrong recipes... I still have to work that part out.