Big Gay Supper Club beckons guests out of the city to Megan Jo Collum and Jess Emrich’s property in New Milford, Conn., for homespun barbecues, potlucks and performances. And Babetown, a roving party for queer women, as well as trans and nonbinary people, sold out its first dinner in September 2016 in 48 hours. It is run by Alex Koones, 29, whom Ms. Alpern, of Queer Soup Night, credits with being one of the first to ignite the current dinner party craze.

On a recent Monday night, Ms. Alpern could be found greeting Bill Clark and Libby Willis at their monthly “queer industry night,” Family Meal. As owners of the self-described “very, very gay” MeMe’s Diner in Prospect Heights, Brooklyn, Mr. Clark, 30, and Ms. Willis, 27, have become linchpins of the L.G.B.T.Q.-centric New York food community since opening in November 2017 (Cuties, a rainbow-fronted coffee shop with a community tab program and monthly “Queers, Coffee & Donuts” sidewalk cookouts, is a hub for those in Los Angeles).

“We’re big fans of MeMe’s,” said Jarry’s Mr. Volger. “That was one of the first times we saw articulated what it meant to be sort of a queer restaurant.”

Mr. Volger, too, was at MeMe’s Diner’s party, and as the room began to swell and guests began to double-fist vegan peanut soft serve and Rainbow Kiss cocktails, the elusive concept of a “queer restaurant” began to crystallize. It wasn’t about a particular type of cuisine (despite the rainbow sprinkles dusting the ice cream). It wasn’t about symbology or décor. It was about the people in the room: industry insiders and outsiders who had largely felt, at one point or another, marginalized by a world that they had begun to reclaim, meal by meal.

“If you essentially don’t have a seat at the table,” Lalito’s Mr. Gonzalez said, “just build your own table.”