Why the kitchen will likely be the life of your holiday party

If you've ever been to a holiday party hosted by friends or family, there's a good chance the kitchen is the place to be.

Partygoers will gather there sip on drinks, lean against the counters and converse as they pick away at appetizers that never stood a chance of making it out the kitchen door.

But what is it about a room that features, likely, few comforts that seems to draw in the action at holiday parties — or really, any party?

It's a question that has piqued the interest of academics, who say our love of the kitchen as a gathering place is shaped by several ingredients.

An evolving room

Rolland Munro, a philosophy professor at the University of Leicester, has studied the social role of kitchens and how the galley has evolved as a room that draws in guests.

In the Middle Ages, opulent homes were a large, one-room "great hall," Munro has written in an academic article. Then, in the 16th century, "withdrawing rooms" emerged for privacy and entertainment. In the 18th century, homes were further divided to keep the kitchen as the "backstage" where servants or culinary mistakes could not be seen.

Now, kitchens are part of the so-called front of house in open-concept homes. Guests are invited to linger and see its inner workings.

"Of course, the funny thing about smart kitchen-diners is how many never see any or much cooking," Munro wrote in an email.

"One of our posh neighbours ordered their Christmas meal in from KFC."

Gender factors

While traditionally, the kitchen has been viewed as a female space, University of Sheffield geography professor Peter Jackson believes that has changed over time as well.

Just look around at your next holiday mixer: there will likely be no shortage of men crowding the counter with empty glasses and beer bottles.

"Kitchens are often seen as the 'heart of the home,' associated with maternal love and care," Jackson wrote in an email, but that meaning of kitchen is changing as some men assume more responsibility for cooking, particularly on special occasions.

During those events, men might take ownership of important meals like a Sunday roast or a barbecue cookout.

That doesn't mean the kitchen is becoming more fundamentally democratic, he wrote in an academic paper, noting that men are likely selectively entering the kitchen on their own terms.

A part of our heritage

Steve Smith of Revelstoke, B.C. offers a simpler explanation for being in the kitchen at parties: "You'd be much closer to the booze and the food."

A transplant from Cape Breton Island, Nova Scotia, Smith has attended East Coast-style kitchen parties his whole life and helps keep the tradition alive in British Columbia with his band, Maritime Kitchen Party.

Maritime kitchen parties are a cultural phenomenon unique to the region, known as both spontaneous and intimate. Friends and family gather for drinks around a wood stove often playing music or dancing.

"You had better acoustics," Smith said. "Everybody's passing around the guitar or telling stories. It's that kind of communal closeness that really typifies what the Maritimes is all about.

"The non-musical people can go watch TV in the living room," he said. "The real entertainment's happening in the kitchen."

What's a host to do?

Put yourself in the host's shoes, however. No matter how much work they do preparing the home for guests, none of it will likely matter since only one room will be used much.

"I don't mind when they gather in the kitchen," said Vancouver etiquette coach Margaret Page. "It's a feel-good place in the home.

"It's built into our DNA to gather around the fire at night to tell stories."

However, hosts can disperse the crowd by arranging food in another room to draw the riff-raff elsewhere.

But, she says, it's best just to embrace it. People will choose the kitchen as the place to gather.

So if you can't stand the meet, stay out of the kitchen.