Jocelyn met Jason when they were students at the University of Vermont. Jason met Bill playing poker in West Barnstable. Bill met Spencer at the annual Greek Food Festival at Saint George Greek Orthodox Church in Centerville. Spencer met Melissa at the Cotuit Center for the Arts, which is where Bill saw Tracy onstage in “Spamalot,” which also had Melissa and Rebecca in the cast, both of whom had met Tracy years earlier at dance classes. Bill met Tracy at Spencer and Melissa’s wedding, thanks to an introduction by Rebecca, who met Nic while playing pool at the Quarterdeck Lounge in Hyannis.

In short, this is a friends circle with long and tight connections. It’s also a group with four talented cooks with diverse skills – the perfect ingredients for Dinner Club. Rotating among houses, we get together every two months or so for a meal that makes Facebook witnesses jealous. We have a core group of eight, but sometimes the host will invite a bonus couple.

In some cases, the friend connections go back more than 20 years, but it was about 10 years ago that we settled into a Dinner Club routine. At first, hosts would make the main course and guests would bring appetizers, side dishes and desserts, but we quickly settled into a system where the hosts prepare all the food, and the guests bring nothing but appetites.

Nic Terkelsen is the experimental food chemist, who also is a master of sushi and Chinese hot pots. Tracy O’Neill is the sultan of sauce (she even used that persona as a Halloween costume), who also makes award-worthy charcuterie boards. Spencer Hallett finds inspiration from his travels, recreating dishes from New Orleans, Spain and elsewhere. Jason Dalrymple is the grill maestro who makes sure that everyone more than meets their protein requirements.

The history’s a little murky, but Spencer deserves as much credit as anyone for creating Dinner Club. “I like good food, and I like spending time with friends, and I’d much rather do it in somebody’s home than in a restaurant,” he said. “We have amazing food. I’ve never been less than wowed by what whoever has put forth, whether it’s somebody doing a five- or six-course meal or Jason grilling a ton of meat. We always joke about having our commune, but it’s a community thing. It’s about getting people together. I don’t ever think of it as a cooking competition. I’m never trying to be better than anyone else. I’m just trying to be better than myself.”

“I enjoy the camaraderie of spending time with each other, but I also enjoy the food,” said Nic. “When it’s my turn to cook, I do enjoy getting to show off my skills a little bit.”

Tracy looks forward to the opportunity to try new things. “Even though it’s not supposed to be a competition, I think Nic, Spencer and I all treat it that way a little bit,” she said. “I love coming up with a theme and then doing some research to figure out all the courses that will go with that and how they will all pair together.

I like going out of my comfort zone a little, but I also like doing things that are in my wheelhouse, like making good sauces or soups or savory appetizers. I like creating a printed menu, getting my graphic design chops in there, and décor, décor, décor. All of it is fun, and then, of course, sharing a meal with great friends is a treat and a blessing.”

One of the best things about Dinner Club, according to Jason, “is watching Nic, Tracy and Spencer try to outdo each other and wow each other. They’re not cooking for the rest of us. They’re cooking for the other two.”

Our chefs developed their skills in different ways.

“My mom made every meal homemade, so I was around for it, but I didn’t really help her,” said Jason. “We would have family gatherings that involved grilling, so I enjoyed that at a young age, but I didn’t really start until I was on my own. That’s just what I gravitate towards. I’ve been mastering the skill for the last 30 years. I became more adventurous and learned how to improve marinades with flavors I like. It was pretty basic at the start, but with trial and error and not being afraid to try new things, I’ve discovered what’s good.”

Tracy learned a few tricks from one of her grandmothers. “I remember we would make spanakopita from scratch,” she said. “She was full-blown Jewish, not Greek or anything, but she knew how to work with phyllo dough. That was just one of those things I learned a long time ago. Once I lived in my own apartment, I liked cooking for myself and my roommate. When I started working in restaurants is when I really got into it. When I got trained as a manager in the restaurants, after I had been a server, we had to go through every station. I washed dishes and bar backed and all of it and did every station behind the line. I grilled, I did broiler, I did salad station, I did sauté, all of it – and I liked it.”

Spencer learned through a mix of cooking shows and trial and error. “My mother was a parent of the ’70s and she cooked very basic things, meat loafs and things like that,” he said. “We had our share of TV dinners when I was a kid. I don’t remember being a foodie as a kid, but as I got a little older, I remember really enjoying food, and that led me to enjoying cooking shows. When you watch them do certain things, you learn what the terms mean. Even Schitt’s Creek, when they talk about folding the cheese, well, what is folding the cheese? By watching the cooking shows, I’ve learned how to read a recipe and how different foods can go together. I liked Alton Brown because he didn’t just cook, but he broke down the science of why, which helped me learn.”

One time, after being inspired by a trip to Spain, he decided to make paella for Dinner Club. Since he was still figuring out the technique, he made it first for his poker buddies. “The cooker wasn’t working right, and everybody was nice enough to say that they enjoyed it, but it definitely wasn’t what I wanted it to be. The next time I put the pan on my grill because the heat needs to be spread out, and it needs to be low. If you do it on a stove, the heat is very centralized in the middle of the pan. It’s a slow cooking meal with a lot of stirring, and that was a good lesson for me.”

Like the rest of our chefs, Nic developed his skills over many years. “Once I started cooking for myself, I found that I actually enjoyed cooking things that tasted good, and I learned a little bit here and a little bit there. I learned kitchen skills – knife skills and prep skills – working in restaurants, but I didn’t really learn how to cook necessarily. I learned more working at Seaside Pub [in Hyannis], working for Uy Phu, then I did anywhere else. He would teach me a little bit about how and why he was doing stuff, more than just do this, do that sort of thing.” Any trial and error along the way? “I’ve definitely had some flavor failures, I would say.”

Creating a menu is a challenge our chefs get into. “I just figure out what I’m in the mood for and that I haven’t cooked yet for this crowd,” said Nic. “Something that I enjoy cooking and something that hopefully everybody else will enjoy as well. I’m not going to go do something crazy spicy or something like that, but most of us have a pretty wide palate, so it’s easy to find something that everybody will enjoy. It’s mostly about what I’m inspired by recently.”

One year, Nic found inspiration at a hot pot restaurant in Boston. He bought his own cookware and created his own boiling sauces for dipping meats and veggies. When he hand-built an outdoor pizza oven, we all benefitted, as we did when Spencer decided to experiment with ceviche. After the O’Neills moved from Centerville to Buzzards Bay, Tracy put together a dinner using as many local ingredients and products as she could find, including lobster from the Lobster Trap, produce from Bay End Farm, and ice cream from Somerset Creamery.

Planning and prep are essential, our chefs agree. “On a weeknight, cooking for the family. I’m never going to do multiple courses other than a meal and a salad, but I love the work once in a while,” said Spencer. “I like to think about trying to make the menu work, not just the flavor profile, but in a way that I can serve it with some sort of continuity. One person doing four or five or six courses is way different than at a restaurant, which has a team of people doing all these courses. I bring out a pad and paper and it’s like, this course is going to take this long, but I can overlap here with the next course, and I can prep this the day before. If there’s something that I can make a hundred percent in advance, a soup or a salad or a sauce, then that’s even better. So, it’s the creativity of the food, but also the creativity of making it work. I’ve never worked in a restaurant, and I don’t think I would ever want to, but it’s fun to try to provide that level of food for all of us.”

Sometimes the hosts concoct a theme cocktail. Rebecca Terkelsen enjoys rising to the challenge of creating a signature drink for the night.

“I try to stay on theme, so if we’re doing an Asian night, I’ll use an Asian whiskey,” she said. “I try to come up with something that I know everybody will like, so nothing too crazy. You have to try it before you serve it, and in the experimenting stage, I’ve made some bad drinks. I had a really good drink at a restaurant we went to a few months ago that I’m trying to figure out how to make.”

The gatherings often include a post-dinner game, like Quiplash or Cards Against Humanity, where the most socially-inappropriate answers get the biggest laughs. The first time Jocelyn Halsey attended Dinner Club, the Halletts were hosting a murder mystery/costume party. That explains why when Jason chats with Jocelyn about his poker buddies, she’ll ask whether he’s referring to Lederhosen Bill (that’s me) or the other Bill.

For Melissa Hallett, food is not the most important ingredient of Dinner Club. “The thing that I always say to Spencer, every single time that we do this, is I don’t care what we eat. We could get takeout pizza. I know that isn’t a foodie-type attitude, but life is really busy and what makes it special to me is all of us just getting together.”

Sometimes our group chat has a couple dozen messages before we’re able to land on a clear date for the next Dinner Club gathering. But it’s worth that small effort to get it locked in and avoid having it drift into the dreaded lost world of “we’ll see each other pretty soon.”

We’ll let Rebecca sum things up. “I love my friends,” she said. “Any excuse to have them all together in one place is always inspirational for me. And I love food. So put those two things together and it’s pretty much a night of bliss.”

Bill O’Neill got his start in the communications industry delivering the Cape Cod Times on his bicycle. When he was a bit older, he was the lifestyle editor at the Times. As a freelancer, he writes about healthcare, pop music and other topics. He lives in Buzzards Bay and enjoys biking, hiking and kayaking.