emember that dinner party you once had, where everyone raved about your food and lingered at the table late into the night? Did you ever wonder why that happened? Did you think it was your conversational A-game, or your marvellous croutons? It was actually (according to researchers at the University of Hohenheim in Germany) because of the tablecloth. They write in the journal Food Quality and Preference, that there’s a pronounced improvement in the overall meal experience and suggest that tableware may help in places where appetite has to be teased out, such as care homes and hospitals. There are all kinds of visual cues that change behaviour around eating. People in dark corners of restaurants eat more calories, because they are less embarrassed to order unhealthy food when no one can see them. Give or take the opposable thumbs, we’re all just dogs hiding under duvets and thinking no one can see us. Heavier cutlery makes us appreciate the food more. Classier glassware boosts our opinion of the drink. There’s probably already someone drilling into why a tablecloth would matter so much, what trick it plays on the rocky relationship between eyes and stomach; I, however, already know why. It speaks of effort. It’s actually not very much effort, so as a host you’re getting a lot of bang for your buck here. You will look like a person who is taking things pretty seriously, has thought ahead, tried to approximate a restaurant’s sense of occasion – and if your friends don’t appreciate this on some important level, and don’t reflect in their own behaviour how glad you obviously are to have them, then you deserve some new friends. My own tablecloth, incidentally, is among my most prized possessions: a friend from Bolivia got it hand-painted with little dancing people in national dress. It can’t even be handwashed without threat to the tiny people, and nobody in south London would know how to repaint the costume of Bolivia, so when I bring this out for you, I really am saying you’re the most important person in my life. But say you have something against tablecloths or perhaps you’re already using one, and your friends still only give your food six out of 10, and don’t linger long enough at the table. Here are a few other ways to keep them sitting down. In with the bullet: cheese. In my youth I experimented with all the cheeses in the world: vast plates heaving with monte enebro and vacherin, all major genres (sheep, cow, goat) and textures (soft, hard, blue) represented, fancy Bath Olivers, grapes and walnuts cascading over it all like delicious waterfalls. Nobody ever finished the cheese. Often, a cheese would not even be started – especially one that arrived at the table whole, which makes people shy. Because I was too stingy ever to throw it away, all I ever ate was cheese. In the wisdom of my great age, I have realised that it’s all about the message. Nobody has to serve a cheese, so when you do, you’re saying: “I don’t want you to leave. I want you to stay.” You can say that with a single baked camembert, or a thousand cheeses. My Mr and I disagree on the subject of sugar: he thinks it makes everyone hyper, I think this is a myth put about on Mumsnet and it has no effect on behaviour. I’m more or less convinced I’m right, except in the peculiar case of red wine sorbet. You don’t need to serve much; you can have it as well as pudding, or instead. All I ask is that you make it yourself, because if you buy it in a supermarket they will have boiled off the alcohol. Some combination of a new temperature, a new way to consume red wine, and (I have to concede) sugar makes everyone come alive. They start singing, unleash rapier wit; it is as if everyone has walked out, walked back in and started the night again. I always thought that if you wanted to do a quiz, it would have to be bespoke for the guests, which is very time-consuming. (A friend once did a Mr and Mrs quiz that included the question: “How would you describe your partner’s lovemaking?”, with a multiple-choice answer featuring the word “festive”. Then at the end, you had to rank everyone around the table by intelligence, on the pretext that your answers would be anonymous, but then they weren’t. This evening was the stuff of legend, though granted, it is the Legend of Why Kirsty and John Split Up and We All Hate Each Other Now). Anyway, I was wrong (again!). Mr W got a pub quizmaster’s set from a secret Santa, with really basic questions such as: “Who sang the Big Bang Theory theme tune?”, and everybody loves it. Cannot get enough of it. Sometimes we do it when there are just two of us. Throw in some tall candles in classy colours (grey, always grey, unless turquoise) and your guests will be with you so long that they will be basically hostages. Next week: how to get people to leave.