Restaurantdates: tips over etiquette, manieren en protocol voor Sugar Babies

Sooner or later he’ll book somewhere lovely — the sort of restaurant with three glasses per setting, a wine list like a novel and staff who move without a sound. These evenings are where a connection really shows itself, because across a small table there’s nowhere to hide: your conversation, your ease, your manners, all of it on display. The good news is that none of it is difficult. It’s just a set of conventions nobody ever taught you, and once you know them you stop thinking about them entirely.

Let’s be clear about the point of learning this, though. It isn’t about performing for anyone, or turning yourself into a well-behaved accessory. These are things you’ll use anywhere: a good restaurant, a friend’s wedding, a business dinner, a christening. Learn them once and they’re yours for life, long after any particular relationship.

Reading the table before you sit down

The first glance at a formal setting is the intimidating bit: too much cutlery, a row of glasses, a folded napkin doing something architectural. It’s all logical, and two tricks decode almost everything.

Work from the outside in. Cutlery is laid in the order you’ll use it, so the outermost fork and knife belong to the first course and you move inwards with each one. If a small, slightly odd-looking fork and a blunt, wide-bladed knife appear, that’s the fish course — they’re shaped that way to lift flesh from bone rather than cut it.

And remember that bread is on your left, drink on your right. The classic mnemonic is BMW — Bread, Meal, Water, left to right — which saves you from the most common mistake at a crowded table: reaching for your neighbour’s bread roll or, worse, their wine.

The glasses themselves sit above the knives on your right, arranged in the order they’ll be used, and each shape has a reason behind it.

One detail worth adopting straight away: hold a wine glass by the stem, not the bowl. Your hand is warm and the wine has been brought to you at a particular temperature — gripping the bowl undoes that in a minute. The brandy balloon is the deliberate exception, since there the warmth is the point.

The silent language of your cutlery

Here’s the one almost nobody knows, and it’s the single most useful thing in this article. In formal service, where you leave your knife and fork on the plate is a message to the staff. It’s called the silent service code, it’s taught in every serious hospitality school, and it exists so a waiter never has to interrupt your conversation to ask whether you’ve finished.

Once you know it, you stop having your plate whisked away mid-conversation — and you stop sitting in front of an empty plate for twenty minutes because nobody could tell.

And one small rule that goes with it: once a piece of cutlery has been used, it never goes back on the tablecloth. It stays in your hand or on your plate, always — which also spares the linen, and is the reason the rule exists.

The wine ritual, finally explained

This one causes more quiet panic than anything else at the table, and it’s built on a misunderstanding almost everyone shares.

When the bottle arrives, you’re shown the label first — actually look at it, because nodding at the label is the unwritten moment you accept the bottle. Then a small measure is poured for tasting, and here’s the thing nobody explains: you’re not being asked whether you like it. That decision was made when you ordered. You’re checking one thing only — whether the wine is faulty, usually “corked”, which smells unmistakably of damp cardboard or a musty cellar. If it does, say so politely and firmly and they’ll replace it. If it’s simply not to your taste, that isn’t grounds for a new bottle.

Two extras that will save you. If the cork is placed beside you, you don’t need to sniff it — that ritual is pure theatre, with no real science behind it, and the wine in your glass tells you far more than a piece of soaked bark ever will. Leave it on the table. And if the bottle has a screw cap, there’s usually no tasting at all, because wine sealed that way can’t be cork-tainted — so if a bottle arrives with a screw cap and nobody offers you a taste, nothing has been forgotten.

Oh, and when your glass is being poured: leave it exactly where it is. Lifting it towards the bottle is a well-meaning instinct that makes the sommelier’s job harder.

The small details that make it effortless

Beyond the layout, a handful of habits are worth having in your pocket. None are difficult, and once they’re second nature you stop thinking about them entirely — which is exactly the point.

Don’t lift the menu off the table. Open it where it lies, read it there, and resist jabbing a finger at a dish — if you have a question, describe the dish rather than pointing at it. It’s simply how menus are handled in a formal room.

Don’t clink glasses. Good crystal is delicate and expensive, and in a quiet dining room the noise lands like a car alarm. Raise your glass, meet his eye, and drink. The eye contact is the whole toast.

Drink from the same spot each time. Rotating the glass leaves marks all the way round the rim; sticking to one point keeps the glass clean for the whole meal.

Napkin on your lap, unfolded discreetly, as soon as you sit. Never shaken open with a flourish. If you get up mid-meal, leave it loosely on your chair — that’s the signal you’re coming back. At the end of the evening, place it on the table gently folded so any marks are tucked inside; nobody wants to look at your lipstick on the linen.

Bread is torn, never cut or bitten. Break off one piece at a time, butter that piece only, and eat it before tearing the next. And move the butter to your own bread plate first rather than going back and forth to the shared dish. There’s a practical reason behind it: it keeps the crumbs contained and the shared butter untouched by anyone’s knife.

Nothing personal on the table. Not your keys, not your bag, not your sunglasses. A handbag goes on your lap, on the hook under the table if there is one, or on the little stool good restaurants provide for exactly this. Anything on the linen makes the staff work around you all night.

Blot your lipstick before the first sip. A quick press with your napkin once you sit down means you don’t leave a print on every glass — a tiny detail, and one that women who dine out often do without thinking.

And a note on the phrase people worry about: in formal European dining, wishing everyone a good meal at the table is generally left to the staff. A warm smile and simply beginning once everyone is served does the job perfectly well.

None of this is about impressing anyone. It’s about not having to think — because the moment the table stops being a puzzle, you’re free to actually enjoy the evening.

The phone stays off the table

This is the one that matters most, and it’s not really about etiquette. Someone has made space in a demanding life for this evening, and a phone lying face-up between you says, wordlessly, that you’re half elsewhere. So put it away. Bag, pocket, anywhere out of sight — and leave it there. No checking between courses. No quick scroll while he’s talking.

The payoff is bigger than good manners. Complete, undivided attention is remarkably rare, especially for a man whose day is a queue of people wanting something from him. Give it properly and you’ll be more memorable than any dress could manage.

Holding a conversation worth having

Etiquette is knowledge, and knowledge can be looked up in an afternoon. Conversation is the real skill, and it’s what he’ll remember.

Start with genuine interest, because it can’t be faked for three courses. If you don’t find him interesting, no amount of technique will rescue the evening — and honestly, you shouldn’t be there. The best preparation is having talked properly beforehand, online or by message, so you arrive with threads to pull on rather than a blank page. Our guide to starting conversations well covers that groundwork.

Then keep it light, especially early on. Save politics and anything heavy for when you know each other properly; a first dinner wants warmth and humour, not a debate. And balance it — a conversation where one person answers question after question stops being a conversation and starts being an interview. Offer something of yourself between each thing you ask.

A sugar baby in Bordeaux told me she spent her first fine-dining evening so focused on getting every fork right that she barely spoke, and the whole thing fell flat. The second time she learned the basics in advance, forgot about them entirely, and simply talked. That one, she said, was the evening that mattered. Being interesting will always outrank being perfect — which is really what opvallen tussen andere sugar babies comes down to.

He’s nervous too, you know

Worth saying plainly, because it changes how the evening feels. A man taking a younger woman somewhere grand is often quietly anxious about it — whether he’ll come across as interesting, whether he’s boring you, whether the age difference will feel awkward once the wine arrives. He may run companies with total composure and still feel slightly out of his depth across the table from you.

Knowing that is oddly freeing. You’re not auditioning for a judge; you’re two people who both want the evening to go well and are both a little on edge about it. Warmth is what settles that, on both sides, faster than anything else.

Dressing for the room

Every venue has its register, so pitch your outfit to the place rather than to a general idea of “smart” — and if you’re unsure, our guide to dresscodes voor elke gelegenheid takes the guesswork out of it. It’s also worth paying attention to how he dresses. A man who arrives by motorbike and one who arrives in a Mercedes are inhabiting different worlds, and matching his register makes you both comfortable.

Beyond that, the old advice holds: make-up understated and elegant, with a bold lip saved for the occasions that deserve it. Jeans, and certainly anything ripped or sporty, belong to a different sort of evening however fashionable they happen to be. And whatever you choose, wear it rather than letting it wear you — an outfit you’re constantly adjusting will occupy you all night.

Gratitude, discretion and knowing when not to ask

Two final habits do more for an evening than any rule about cutlery.

The first is genuine appreciation. Notice the effort — the table he chose, the wine he picked, the thought behind it — and say so, once, warmly. Extend it to the room as well: thank the staff, be kind to the waiter. How you treat someone who can do nothing for you says more about you than anything on the menu, and men notice it far more than women expect.

The second is discretion. Curiosity is natural with someone experienced and interesting, but there’s a line between a conversation and an interrogation. Let him share his past, his work and his family at his own pace rather than pulling it out of him — if he steers away from something, follow him without comment. That restraint earns more trust than any question would have answered, and it’s a big part of what makes him open up eventually. It’s also how these connections grow into something closer to real mentorship rather than a pleasant evening that goes nowhere.

The real secret

Learn all of this once and then forget it, because the point was never the rules. The most impressive person at a fine restaurant isn’t the one performing etiquette. It’s the one who clearly isn’t thinking about it — relaxed, funny, entirely herself — and who happens to hold her glass by the stem without noticing she’s doing it. That ease is the thing. And it comes from knowledge, not from nerves. For more on carrying yourself well across every part of this, our volledige sugar baby gids and our overview of wat het zijn van een sugar baby inhoudt are both worth your time.

Restaurant etiquette: FAQ

Dit artikel is geschreven en beoordeeld door de redactie van Sugar Daddy Planet en Polaris Nexus.