‘The cold, hard truth about eating outside is, it’ll probably be 11C, so pack a bobble hat and wear thermal knickers’
After the initial burst of glee that many of us felt on seeing the roadmap to recovery back in February, a quieter realism has set in. All dining until mid-May at least – which is an arduously long period – will involve eating outside. Notice that I did not say “eating outdoors”, which is that first, delicious mouthful of Cornish pasty on a windswept beach or a sandwich pulled from a plastic box halfway up Scafell Pike. In these cases, food tastes better outdoors.
Eating “outside”, on the other hand, is very different. This is when your local landlord assembles a £25 Dunelm gazebo in a loading bay and passes it off as a “deluxe dining terrace”. Eating outside is what London’s fancier restaurants are actually promising, with their VIP rooftop greenhouses, bottomless champagne pool cabanas and heated pergolas. All of this is a fig leaf over the cold, hard truth: it’s likely to be 11C out there, so pack a bobble hat and wear thermal knickers.
Still, if outside is all we’re permitted for now, and it’s a way to kickstart the economy, then I’m committing to the cause. We ponder a lot about British values – these days, they are mysterious, contentious and ever-moving – but one I will suggest is a defiance in the face of bad weather, and an in-built determination not to let a bit of trench foot spoil a picnic; to keep buggering on regardless of soggy bunting, flooded lawns and rain-battered marquees.
