I think that's a French thing yeah. Here in Spain if people make dinner it's really a special occasion and you'd tell them they are coming for 'dinner'. Usually you do something really simple like finger food, get takeout or just grab some beers and snacks at the cafe downstairs.

The idea is to spend the most time with your friends, not in the kitchen. But I know in France food is a bigger thing.

The thing is also that here dinner is usually an afternoon thing.

My experience in south of Spain is that nobody invite people at home but the migrants. Spanish just like to meet outside.

But maybe that is a particularity of my area where houses / appartments are small, food is relatively inexpensive outside and weather is almost always good enough to go out.

Also preparing dinner doesn't mean you can't spend time with friends. As a French if I am invited to dinner and someone is cooking, I usually offer my help in the preparation. It is a nice occupation alongside a beer or a glass of wine and a great way to share an activity while having a chat with your host. Actually there are some other cultures where preparing the food is an integral part of the whole "spending time together thing". For example in latin america women would chat for hours preparing stuff in the kitchen while men would typically doing the same around the BBQ.

Same here in Catalonia, inviting people to your house is not really done. We just meet outside.

And the menu deals during lunchtime are amazing. 12 euro for 3 courses. Add some drinks and you have passed hours for cheap.

And yeah I have seen that latin thing, my ex was a latina and I saw them often socialising while making food. But in that culture preparing food seems to be very much a "women-only" thing where the men hang on the couch with a beer :P Whereas our roles here in europe are much less traditional. So it's not quite as mixed for them in terms of the pre-dinner socialisation. I tried to go into the kitchen to help/chat at one point but I didn't think I was very welcome there.

However I only know that one latino family well. Perhaps they are an outlier.

> The only time its okay to order food its when people came for something else in the first place

When I invite friends over it is always for something else other than food, by which I mean it's for hanging out together. Food just needs to be there because if we're going to be hanging out for 4-8 hours we'll need to eat.

I think you don't understand french culture. Sharing meal together is an integral part of hanging out together there. :)

Meh. I'm from balkans and there are 100 things that you'd say are "our culture" that neither I nor my friends care about. If I couldn't invite friends to play board games without they expecting me to cook, I'd find better friends.

I'd say that if I invite friends to do "anything", it is because I am prepared to feed them if needed. I don't have to cook per se, I can just heat premade (by me or bought) stuff. I also expect them to bring something to drink if they like beers or wine. It is not like one necessarily need to spend hours in the kitchen.

Grabbing a bag crisps and a pizza ready to go to the oven beats having to fire up an app and decide/argue for minutes wether we want sushi, poké, noodles, pastas or a pizza.

> I'd say that if I invite friends to do "anything", it is because I am prepared to feed them if needed

Agreed! Though I think ordering is also perfectly fine, as are the other options you mentioned.

But what prompted me to respond in the first place was:

> but here in France if you invite some friends over, you are expected to cook. The only time its okay to order food its when people came for something else in the first place (moving, doing some handywork...)

Which is just silly.

I think the poster narrowed that to the typical invitation to meet and have lunch.

I wouldn't "invite" people to help me move or do some handywork, it would rather be called "asking for help". And I know there are other kinds of invitations: playing board games, video games or music, making arts, group sex or whatever other activities one can think of that can be done in groups and yes in that case you might not expect the host to cook necessarily. My experience is that in France people would generally bring something anyway or at the very least ask what they should bring, even if it is just a bag of crisps and a few beers when meeting someone at their place.

Among my crowd in the US, the host may order some pizza but it's generally pot luck to some degree. Personally, I'll at least cook a main dish (and would be happy to do more) but people will bring stuff anyway and then we'll have too much food :-)