potluck

[ pot-luhk, -luhk ]
See synonyms for potluck on Thesaurus.com
noun
  1. food or a meal that happens to be available without special preparation or purchase: to take potluck with a friend.

  2. Also called potluck supper, potluck dinner, potluck lunch . a meal, especially for a large group, to which participants bring various foods to be shared.

  1. whatever is available or comes one's way: With fluctuating interest rates, homebuyers are learning to take potluck with the banks.

Origin of potluck

1
First recorded in 1585–95; pot1 + luck

Words Nearby potluck

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2024

How to use potluck in a sentence

  • He loved that idea, and suggested a potluck dinner of sushi and strawberry smoothies and readings from our favorite books.

    My Post-Ultra-Orthodox Wedding | Leah Vincent | March 21, 2014 | THE DAILY BEAST
  • So, offer to bring a gorgeous pie (or cobbler, crisp, crumble, tart, compote or charlotte) to your next potluck invite.

  • Him that draws most of the potluck in this world is the same that drops most in.

    The Belted Seas | Arthur Colton
  • Declining reluctantly an invitation to take potluck with my host, I was soon in the Avenue of the Sphinx again.

    The Ways of Men | Eliot Gregory

British Dictionary definitions for pot luck

pot luck

nouninformal
    • whatever food happens to be available without special preparation

    • (as modifier): a pot-luck dinner

  1. whatever is available (esp in the phrase take pot luck)

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Other Idioms and Phrases with potluck

potluck

see take potluck.

The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary Copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.