No whiff of detergent can mar the reunion with pizza

FORGET your last meal, what would your first one be? After four months, we are allowed to eat out again, and all I really want is pizza.

Sure, you can have it at home. But it is not quite the same as at a pizzeria. So here I am, at the as yet only reopened branch of Pizza Pilgrims.

It is all pleasingly, reassuringly, mundanely normal. Different, of course, but somehow still normal.

Half the tables have been jettisoned, indoors and in the courtyard, to comply with social distancing guidelines.

Some tables have perspex screens between them. Capacity is down by around half, and the waiters seem very excited to be working again. A Quick

‘A QR code on the table brings up the menu on my phone, yet I cannot put the order through’

Response code on the table brings up the menu on my phone, yet I cannot put the order through – teething issues. Thankfully, there are also (disposable) paper menus.

My girlfriend and I opt for the Nduja pizza, which is delicious. Pepper grinders and chilli oil are brought on request, and sanitised by staff.

What reminds me most of the pandemic during the meal is the lingering whiff of detergent.

Around half the tables are taken – young parents delighted not to cook for their children, couples on dates, friends gossiping. All rather normal.

The return of restaurants is tinged with poignancy. For the precarious economy threatening their existence, for those already shut, for jobs lost. Yet it is also a welcome sign that, albeit slowly, we can convene over food, drink and conversation once more.