The Best Seat in the House

Company is lovely, and company is a tax; alone, the food gets your whole attention and all of your nerve.

10 October 2026

The worst course of the meal is the waiter's pity — that little tilt of the head when you say one. Refuse it. I have eaten alone at a zinc counter in Lyon with a glass of Beaujolais and a quenelle the size of a forearm, and I remember that sauce better than I remember most conversations.

That's the argument. Half your attention goes to the table, and the dish gets whatever's left. Alone, you notice that the salt was pulled back a shade, that there's anchovy under the lamb, that the bread came warm and the second basket didn't. You eat at your own tempo: fast when the thing demands speed, slow over the last cold inch of wine. You order the offal. Nobody flinches.

A table for one isn't a seat you settle for. It's the best seat in the house, and you booked it.