Over my lifetime, I reckon I have participated in hundreds of potluck dinners and suppers. But who's counting?

I have enjoyed homemade dishes prepared by family members, friends, church members, monks, fraternal organizations, hippies, PTAs, politicians, Boy Scouts and campfire hot-dog roasters.

I am still alive.

I have never suffered any ill after-effects from a potluck meal. Not once.

I am a big fan of covered-dish affairs -- emphasis on "big." My eating habits give me away.

So when Jay Nixon, the new governor of Missouri, decided to have a potluck meal as part of his reasonably priced Inauguration Day events, I immediately liked the idea.

Just imagine: Missourians showing up from 114 counties and the city of St. Louis with their local favorites. There would be barbecue and kettle beef and bread-and-butter pickles and tons of fried chicken. There would be potato salad and coleslaw and seven-layer salad and Jell-O concoctions beyond imagination. There would be casseroles of every description and vegetables swimming in cream-of-something soup and topped with those yummy french-fried onions. There would be yeast rolls and cinnamon rolls and fruit pies and cream pies and maybe even a three-layer cake iced with gooey chocolate frosting.

And then the bureaucrats took over.

State health officials said they wanted to protect Missouri's top elected officials, their families and their well-wishers. So there would be state-regulated hamburgers, which I presume taste like school-regulated lunchroom hamburgers, and potluckers would be limited to bringing store-bought cookies for dessert.

Store-bought!

My mother and my aunts would have rather sucked mud than take anything store-bought to a potluck dinner. I'll bet Gov. Nixon's mother was the same way.

Think about it. If you have ever suffered from food poisoning -- I have, and it isn't pretty -- did you get poisoned at a family feast? Or was it at a restaurant?

When you read about outbreaks of salmonella or deadly E. coli, do you also read that the cause was Aunt Emma's Chicken Noodle Surprise? No, you read that some food-service worker -- a professional -- in some government-inspected restaurant, or some field worker -- also a professional -- in some government-inspected tomato patch, forgot to wash his hands after ... well, you don't want all the full-blown details.

So here's my question for the state health department: What makes store-bought food any safer than Aunt Emma's? I'll wager your aunts and all your recipe-swapping cousins know more about preparing safe meals than a whole kitchen full of professionals who are working in some government-regulated food-processing plant until they can get a real job.

Eating store-bought cookies, laden with chemicals to preserve freshness, at an event like Inauguration Day sounds downright awful. It's un-American. Well, it's certainly un-Missourian.

Mr. Nixon, I think you had a grand idea for a statewide potluck celebration. But since the bureaucrats thwarted your good intentions, you might want to think about inviting some of our state's fine cooks to the Mansion. Make it a real potluck. You and your better half wouldn't have to provide anything except hospitality and a hearty appetite.

I don't like to brag, but I make a mean apple pie stuffed with apples grown right here in the Show Me State. I think even the governor would say it's mighty tasty.

And it's safe.

Mr. Nixon, the next time you want to have someone over for a potluck meal, remember this: You're the governor now, which is like being the boss. Any boss who let's the hired help run the show usually doesn't keep his job very long. Something to think about.

And if your new potluck policy gets the state into some hot water, so what? That's why we have an attorney general.

jsullivan@semissourian.com