I always met new men in pubs — could I stomach the rise of the first-date dinner?

Something has happened to London’s dating scene since I last dipped my toe in three years ago. Granted, back then it was all a bit of a whirlwind. I was postpartum and reeling from the abrupt end of my long-term relationship. All that mattered to me was proving that someone, anyone, would find a 35-year-old single mum attractive. Dating then, as it had been throughout my twenties, was all about the pub. The reasoning for this was simple: everyone wanted to feel relaxed with a drink or two under their belt. For me, the pub had always been my safe space. It wasn’t too quiet, it wasn’t too romantic, it wasn’t too formal. It made conversation easier and less awkward. These were all important things to me following the end of the relationship with my daughter’s father. I had been completely blindsided by the split, and as such, felt quite shellshocked as I started to throw myself back into dating. It was far too early, I can see that now. But fast-forward three years, and a lot of healing and growing has been done. Not to mention I am no longer living with my mother and have a place of my own. And I’m not breastfeeding. It’s always good to not be breastfeeding when you’re dating. But imagine my surprise when I started dating again in seriousness recently, and discovered that the pub was out, and that the dinner date had made a surprising return. A recent survey by Tinder found that 42 per cent of users prefer a dinner date for a first date due to a desire for genuine connection and quality conversation. Meanwhile, among the non-drinking Gen Z daters (though to be honest, the less said about them the better) 44 per cent said dinner was their top date choice.It seems we have collectively forgotten about the associated risks — open-mouthed chewing, food in our teeth and being stuck with someone for the duration of at least two courses — and instead reprogrammed our brains to see restaurants as evidence of effort and pubs as symptomatic of a lack of seriousness. Out in the wild, a quick glance around places like Impala, Dover Street Counter or Vesper and you’ll see couples on dates everywhere. You can spot them a mile off — smiling sweetly, laughing heartily, sticking to dishes that don’t contain lots of teeth-seeking herbs.The trial of the fussy eaterOf course, I was dubious when I was asked on my first ever first-date dinner. I even tried to push back by suggesting the pub. But he was having none of it. I decided to think of this as charming and chivalric. Instead it turned out he was just a food snob who wanted to prove he knew what yuzu hollandaise was.My 10-course dinner date felt like watching the gastronomic equivalent of Djokovic’s five-hour Wimbledon matchMy second first-time dinner date — with a different suitor — occurred a few weeks later, this time, rather bravely on my part, at a restaurant that offered a 10-course tasting menu and wine pairing. To my real horror, he was a fussy eater, and a vegan, which meant there was far too much back and forth with the waiter over the menu than I’d have liked. Sometimes it felt like I was watching the gastronomic equivalent of Djokovic’s five-hour Wimbledon match. (“Well do you eat nuts?” “I’m allergic to peanuts.” “Ah, how about beetroot?” ad infinitum). Naomi, 33, and her fiancé first met on a dinner date, and she’s always been a champion of its virtues. “The way that somebody treats and interacts with staff and other people generally is, in my opinion, very telling of their character,” she says. “Then there’s table manners. Imagine falling in love with somebody and not knowing they chew with their mouth open, or they pour water for themselves and not you. Food is important to me, and I need to know that somebody I’m potentially going to be spending a lot of time with likes to eat, and eat well. None of this high-protein, low-carb nonsense. I like a person who enjoys life, enjoys eating and drinking, and that is never more apparent than it is when you’re at dinner with somebody.” A recipe for success?It’s also unsurprising in many ways that we are seeing backlash against low-effort dates. After all, the ubiquitousness of dating apps has meant that many treat others as if they are expendable, especially in huge cities like London, where people might squeeze in multiple coffee dates a week and then follow up with nobody. And while it used to be that we saw quick, low-effort dates such as coffee as a good thing in order to pre-screen our potential suitors, for many it ended up feeling as though they were disposable and that their date wasn’t actually serious about finding a connection. Of course, that’s not to say the dinner date as a first date is a recipe for success — there are certainly cases where a pre-prepared exit strategy is essential. “I’d been chatting to a guy on Raya for ages and had actually decided we probably weren’t compatible, but he was incredibly persistent about taking me for dinner,” remembers Annie, 35. “I admired the persistence enough to give him a chance and picked somewhere I’d been wanting to try because my theory is that if the date’s awful, at least you’ve crossed a restaurant off your list. It turned out to be one of those painfully long dinners where the waitress could actually see the despair in my eyes.” The biggest pro of a dinner date in my mind is this: with my stomach lined, I can actually remember what happened the next day. And that’s definitely not something that could be said of the pub date era in my twenties.Read MoreRebecca Cope is a freelance writer and editor