Mouthing Off: Small Tables

Small may be beautiful, but not when you’re talking about the size of restaurant tables too tiny to do the job…

Whoever said size doesn’t matter was lying. It does. Particularly when it comes to the size of restaurant tables. Part and parcel of the seemingly unceasing trend for hip food joints where diners are encouraged to get down ‘n’ dirty with their food while surrounded by exposed brickwork and industrial lighting is The Small Table. I don’t mean some ridiculous doll’s house furniture trend you haven’t yet heard about. What I’m talking about are the tables you will see in most restaurants, perfectly normal looking, apparently reasonably sized tables.

But they’re not reasonable at all. You know that these glorified food holders (because that’s ultimately what they are) can’t do their job properly. Everyone knows. They simply do not have enough surface area to accommodate everything that is going to be put on them. You know, like plates. And tumblers. And wine glasses. And napkins. And cutlery. And menus. And condiments. And perhaps a jaunty centrepiece. And probably your phone – if you’re part of the Instabrigade, definitely your phone, and the iPhone 6 is not small. That is a lot of things. All very normal things – it’s not like we’ve asked for an ice statue. So why, oh why, oh why is there never enough room on the sodding table?

Even more baffling is the reaction of the waiter/waitress upon discovering, apparently for the first time, that there isn’t enough space on the table. Admittedly, they didn’t design them, but how many times a day do they ‘discover’ this? Yet without fail a frown of perplexed bemusement clouds their face, quickly replaced by a look of steely determination as they rearrange plates, bowls and spoons until everything fits in perfect tessellation – until you move an inch and the whole lot comes crashing down. Before you know it, your scallops are in the lap of the man at the neighbouring table and you’ve knocked over the wine so the prawns are swimming in your Pinot-soaked risotto.

On the flip side, one could argue that it’s the plate’s fault. Have they grown along with our waistlines? Indeed, many of them have metamorphosed into anything but a plate; wooden boards, tin buckets and even ping pong bats became such A Thing that #WeWantPlates started trending on Twitter. Or perhaps it’s the style of our feasting. Sharing plates where everyone dives in are the order of the day. The result? Enough small dishes to rival Yo! Sushi and less space than the Northern line during rush hour.

And it doesn’t stop there. Small tables are (for the most part) small so restaurateurs can pack more of them in, forcing diners to do that awkward dance-hop as they attempt to navigate their way to the loo. For a hip, street food-style joint where quality is high but prices need to stay low, doing as many covers as possible a night is crucial to their success. And more tables mean more covers.

So is this a necessary evil? Frankly, no. I’m not asking for a table on a par with that of The Last Supper, a few more inches would do the trick. That’s why it’s so frustrating, they are just that little bit too small, much like those jeans that you can very nearly do up.

It can be done. At Clerkenwell’s Bourne and Hollingsworth Buildings airy rooms play host to a scattering of tables; enough for a buzzy vibe but not so many you can overhear the couple arguing at the next table. They’re also reasonably (there’s that word again) sized, comfortably accommodating a whole water jug. A famous Covent Garden restaurant does not fare so well, however, with one Square Meal reader lamenting online: “We had four people on a small square table where we could not get our legs under the table it was so cramped. The waiter could not fit the glasses, bread, water and wine bottles on the table without placing items directly in front of us where the plates of food should be…” We hear you Clive J. I’m thinking of starting #WeWantBiggerTables on Twitter. Who’s with me?

 

This article was first published in the summer 2015 issue of Square Meal Lifestyle magazine