Hodgepodge, meaning a collection of dissimilar components or a mixture of dissimilar ingredients, is a variant of hotchpotch, which itself is a variant of hotchpot, a legal term meaning the gathering...
hodgepodge is defined as a mixture or jumble so I assume it would be used like this... The crowd consisted of a hodgepodge of people; ranging from architects and businessmen to construction workers...