5 Modern Day Table Manners You Must Know

Life, like table manners, has moved on from the days our mothers insisted we drank soup from the side of the spoon, rested our cutlery on the plate not the table, don't eat potatoes off the end of your knife, don't fill your mouth to bursting point with food before chewing it and refrained from slurping the spaghetti.

Today we get upset by other things: techno-irritants, boo-rish behavior, lazy snores, casual snobbery, odd new orthodoxies of staff-client interaction, careless chewing and so on.

In what should be an atmosphere of relaxation and nourishment, the air can sometimes be thick with tension.

Table manners, supposedly the sign of a gentleman, were in reality an expression of the middle class's terror of being thought "common".

Well, let us now attempt to relieve it all, with 5 modern commandments for diners to follow…

1. Thou Shalt Not Have an iPhone Before Thee

When did it become acceptable to have your mobile on the table all the way through dinner?

2. Thou Shalt Not Food-Blog

Neither Tweet Nor Instagram Thy Food. Do you really want people to think you've never eaten out before?

3. Thou Shalt Not Smoke On The Dinner Table

You must resist the temptation of puffing cigars and go outside with the other suckers else you are considered a nincompoop and may offer to fart in your face.

4. Thou Shalt Not Do Stupid Signs in the Air

Avoid snapping your fingers and yelling, "waiterrrrr!" Or sketch a rudimentary signature in the air with a languidly imperious hand. The thing is; waiters are liable to ask if you're having a fit. Just call one over and say, "We'd like the bill please."

5. Thou Shalt Not Speak while Eating

This is the simplest thing to do! Shut up and eat! Avoid spitting saliva and food particles into people's faces and plates just because you choked. Keep your mouth busy with food not words!

Hope you took something out of these few. Please tell us more if we omitted anything...