No, the OP is talking about friends who invited him to their home for supper and then had them pay for it. Big difference.
I for one didn’t say that the OP shouldn’t maintain a friendship with the OP. I just wouldn’t go to their house for dinner.
And I sure as hell wouldn’t stay friends with a person who cheated me out of $5000. YMMV.
When did the host directly ask the OP for money? Are there other possible scenarios, as Dread Pirate Danno (and I) have suggested?
When the other guest asks the question, the OP can’t possibly know for certain if he is included in the “we”. Maybe he/she was simply referring to the SO.
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I agree. And if the host simply forgot to inform the OP that he was expected to pay, that is the host’s problem.
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But the point is that the host accepted money from the OP.
It was rude.
Exactly. If the host didn’t expect all his guests to pay, why did he take ice1000’s money? Why didn’t he say, “Oh, no, Joe and I worked this out ahead of time. Besides, you brought this lovely creme brulee and the nice daquiris”?
Good point, burundi and zephyrine. The first time I read it I missed the part where the host accepted the money from ice1000
Hmmmm. I am doing my best to give the host the benefit of the doubt, but he is making it damn difficult to justify his actions.
I can be fairly uptight, but I would probably have mentioned that I didn’t have the money as I didn’t realize that they were asking guests to cover the cost of dinner. I would then have offered to come back another day with the money.
They could try to make me wash dishes, but I doubt that they would like the quality of my work.
As soon as everyone started paying up, I would have made a huge production of getting up and leaving without saying a word.
That is just beyond rude.
The only way that this could be considered anything but the height of vulgarity is if the host was under the impression that the OP had been informed of the arrangment either by someone else in the party or thought that they had informed the OP themselves but it had slipped there mind (possibley it is a regular event and they are so used to the arrangment that they forgot?) Other than this scenario I think that there is no excuse, you don’t invite people to your house then bill them for the meal! I am pretty convinced that no-one could possibley be such a cheapskate so if I were you I would have a quiet word with the host and try and find out if there was a misunderstanding. I’m hoping that this is the case but if it turns out not to be i’d be forced to bill them for the daiquiris and strawberries not to mention the cost of the creme brulee (including labour costs if homemade).
At least one did that we saw.
perhaps i’m seeing a bit of a conspiracy here …
when does a guest in the middle of dinner nonchalantly ask the host " how much do we owe you?"
when i read the op, i had the image of the host and a good friend coming up with a strategy to recoop some of the dinner cost. “hey, would you mind asking me how much y’all owe me for dinner?” “perhaps a few people will pony up.”
i’m a bit taken aback at a guest asking for a dinner price; and a host having a price ready to give.
you would have been quite correct in not paying.
I have many “poor” (so to speak) friends myself. Nobody said they should be excluded. They just shouldn’t host dinner parties at which they serve a very expensive menu that they cannot afford and then expect their guests to pay. I’m quite sure poor people’s true friends don’t fault them for having hamburgers and chips instead of Chateaubriand.
I agree that it’s rude to ask for money at a dinner party.
However, I think it’s even more rude to make a big argument about it or leave in a huff over it as some people are suggesting.
It’s also normal in some situations for people to pay at a party, IME.
How old are you, ice1000? How old were the others at the gathering? How many people were there?
I’m 27. If I go to a dinner party of my parents or their friends it would be appallingly rude for them to ask for payment. However, if I go to a party of other 20-somethings like a backyard cookout it is very usual for everyone to chip in $5 or $10 for the keg and burgers.
In my experience, the younger the crowd and the larger the crowd the more likely you will have to pay. The older and smaller the group means it’s more likely the host will pay.
It could also be the unusual tradition of the group you were hanging with that they all chip in. Maybe everyone knew this and assumed you did? Certainly you should have been told in advance, but such an oversight is hardly the rudest thing I can imagine.
I don’t know that it’s more rude, but it is definitely rude to cause a scene.
The key question is whether ice1000 was advised in advance that he was expected to cover the cost of any portion of the dinner. If he was, then no problem. Obviously he wasn’t. Thus, the rude.
And he brought all that stuff too! Did all the other guests bring something? Although that would just make it worse - contributing food to the dinner AND being asked to pay.
I guess I am too old-fashioned. To me, guests are guests. Not customers. I sort of feel that once people are out of school and have real jobs and are acting like responsible adults in the other areas of their lives, there should be none of this “chipping” in brand of entertaining. (Chipping in with money, I mean - if people are amenable to pot-luck dinners, I have no problem with that.)
Adults give parties are are “paid back” by being invited to other parties. They don’t have to be the same kind of party; that is, the rich people can give stone crab & Champagne parties and the people with lower income can give pizza & jug-o’-wine parties. People can all arrange to meet at a restaurant and each pay for their own meals. But turning a private home into a restaurant and turning your friends into the clientele is just plain crass.
What an extraordinarily lucrative idea! When I have my wedding reception, maybe I can ask for $60 a head and make a great profit! 
Seriously, that does seem to be awfully rude to invite people over and ask them to pay for their own meal, especially a $30 meal. I know, I know - it sounds cheap, but…$30?? That’s kind of an expensive meal at a restaurant, not to mention at a friend’s house. Especially if you had already spent money on contributing a bottle of wine and creme brulee. Your friend should have at least given you a discount! 
Guests shouldn’t have to make a visit to the ATM or make sure to bring a checkbook to a friend’s party. I’d think again about attending another one of their dinners. You might find out if she takes Diner’s Club or American Express.
Yes, it’s a huge, HUGE difference! If my friends say “hey, let’s all go out for pizza.” I expect to pay my share. Anytime I go to a restaurant with friends in fact, I expect to pay my share unless the invitation specified that I was being “treated to dinner”.
A formal invitation to dine at a person’s home is a completely different affair. Unless it is explicitly specified in the invitation (and even then it’s dodgy etiquette), the invitation is like a gift. And we’re not talking fine, high class manners here, we’re talking very basic social conventions.
Count me along in the chorus that finds this so appalling it belongs among the stories of the webiste of EtiquetteHell.com.
And don’t ask as for hanging out with “poor” friends. Aside from the occasional extravagance that my “poor” friends could ill-afford but still manage, I have always enjoyed a great time in their company and would never be expected to pay for a meal. Again, they are inviting you to dinner as a gesture that is commensurate with a gift. And, as gifts always should be, it should be within their means. Be it roast lobster or burgers on the barbie, it’s appreciated all the same.
Asking guests to pay for their meals is like asking them to pay for their Christmas presents after you’ve presented it to them, they’ve unwrapped them, and are thrilled with them. It is one of the most egregious faux pas I’ve heard about in ages.
OP the polite way to deal with it, is to simply decline future invitations, but feel free to invite them over. They may simply be clueless, so if they offer to pay, you feign mild shock and say “we wouldn’t hear of it!”
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BTW coq-au-vin is a great meal that feels extravagant and is a lot of fun for social occasions. Easy to make, classy, yet is based on a “peasant’s meal” so it won’t break the bank, but will still be a treat.
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That’s not an “invitation to dinner” and the “cost” also well-specified in the invitation. That’s in the same spirit as a potluck and is usually planned as a group (often ad hoc). “Let’s all do this! We can use my backyard. Since we don’t know who all is coming, so just show up and then we’ll all go on a beer run and buy the burgers while we’re at it.”
Otherwise, it’s also explicit in the invitation “you bring the weenies and five bucks, with all of us chipping in, we can get a keg.”
It’s not the same thing as hosting a dinner party. Geez, even when I was teenager that difference was clear.
I agree. There IS an occasion where people come over to my house and pay for the privilege of eating there: it’s called “Ordering out for Pizza,” and it happens about once a week. Hell, sometimes I don’t even have any pizza, if I eat dinner before folks show up.
But that’s when the evening’s activities aren’t food centered: that’s when I get together with half a dozen friends for a night of good geeky gaming. When I invite them over for dinner, I would be utterly freaked out if they offered me money for dinner.
I’ve also been at parties with cash bars: the host asks folks to kick in a buck for every mixed drink they get from his supply of liquor. That’s also fine, because a) it’s not a dinner party and b) nobody has to drink and c) people can bring their own liquor if they want.
Daniel
I was thinking, the only way I can see the host not being a total schmuck, would be if the were so flabbergasted by the guest saying: “So how much do we owe you?” (which is a considerable social gaffe itself) that they lost all sense of reason and decorum. Remember, it’s also very rude to point out someone else’s rudeness - perhaps they ended up all kerfuffled in an etiquette feedback loop. You know, trying to protect the guest from his own gaffe, but boggling the recovery.
Example:
“So how much do I owe you?”
Crayons the Perfect Host: “Dear friend. We are deeply touched by your kind and generous offer, however, as our guest we neither require nor expect any kind reimbursement. Thank you very much for your gracious offer, but we must decline.”
Crayons the Not-so-perfect Host: “HUH??? What? don’t want that idiot to look like fool, what to do? what to do? Oh,… er, welll, uh… it would be about $30…”
Dammit! Need a recovery. Pray that no one else pays… then I can discreetly return the money and - dammit! somebody else paid!!! - What have I done! Now I have to admit that my one guest is a boob, or take the boobage unto myself… hee-hee I thought “boobage”.
Crayons the Pretty Bad Host: “What? Whatsa matta with you??? You don’t offer to pay for dinner! You’re a guest here numbnuts!”
From the OP:
We aren’t talking about an “invitation to dinner”, we are talking about a party. Sheesh. Read the OP.
Sure, you have a point here. I mentioned two factors: age and the size of the group. You bring up another: spontaneity. Things that are planned short term tend to be more often chip in than things planned in advance.
The OP also mentions that the party had been planned in advance, but only a week before the host told the guests that food had been ordered for the party.
A buddy of mine has a cookout style pool party in his yard every year. It’s not planned as a group, he plans it. It’s planned months in advance and a couple hundred people show up. He charges $10 a head, IIRC. I don’t see anything wrong with this. He is providing his home for us to use, why should he be out hundreds of dollars for the trouble?
When I was a teenager I seemed to have better reading comprehension than you do now.