THE WEBSITES YOU NEED TO BAG THE BEST TABLES

One of the great Covid cruelties has been the way it has robbing us of spontaneity, at a time when we’ve never needed it more. Restaurant block-bookers may think they’re ahead of the game by pre-scheduling all of their future fun, but in a pandemic it’s the last-minuter who’s really laughing.

In an industry being crippled by cancellations – according to the Office for National Statistics, 45 per cent of all table bookings last month cancelled or failed to show – agreeing to swoop in for dinner at the eleventh hour is practically a public service.

Restaurant reservation sites, such as Opentable (opentable. co.uk) and Resy (resy.com), operate lowstakes virtual waiting lists that are worth getting on. Both allow you to set alerts for when a table at that spot with the monthslong waiting list unexpectedly becomes free; you just add in a few details, such as party size and preferred date and times, and – boom – someone’s unfortunate lateral flow is your meal ticket.

There’s no guarantee that the “Hot Table Alert” email will come, of course – and leaving yourself to the mercy of others’ cancellations is probably not advisable when there’s a landmark birthday at stake.

But in a world that now seems to mainly comprise of its least interesting elements being made more headacheinducing, the thrill of snagging a last-minute table unexpectedly is all the more delicious.