Back to office will mean re-engineering lunch

With the COVID-19 pandemic showing the first signs of letting up amidst news that a vaccine by the first quarter of 2021 may be a real possibility, companies have begun planning for a return to work-from-office. With that thoughts will turn to the most important part of the work day — lunch. Already, the dabbawalas of Mumbai are back on the streets, ferrying food to thousands of office goers, but other cities aren’t so lucky. So lunch has to be planned once people start going back to work.

So, what will be the proper etiquette for lunch in the office in the post-pandemic world?

One thing is clear, milling around the counters of the office cafe while lazily exploring the menu isn’t happening any time soon. Nor will there be those raucous group lunches of half a dozen people sharing joyously from each other’s plates. That seems like a different era now, when you built chemistry by eating with the team. Now it is all about virology and mass eating is taboo.

For starters, we could go back to being what we were before the British colonised our land and transformed our food habits. That means eating a full meal before leaving for work. That was the trend in most communities in the country till breakfast entered our lexicon and power lunches destroyed our appetite.

Having had a hearty meal of fish curry and rice with some dal and posto, Mukherjee babu would stay sated through the next eight hours, often needing nothing more than some chai and biscuit to make it through the day before rushing home for some evening tiffin. Former Hindustan Unilever Ltd. head honcho Sushim Datta was one CEO who would often have just a cup of tea for lunch. Another consumer goods top boss made do with a G&T often shunning any accompaniments.

The other option will be for people to emulate the office loner, burying their head in a book while edging food from their closely guarded tiffin boxes into their barely open mouths. Under the present circumstances, that may actually be the safest strategy though it too comes with its share of hazards since it will mean standing, at a safe distance, in an excruciatingly long queue to reheat your food in the microwave which will have to be cleaned out every time a clumsy colleague spills her chana masala.

Another variant may be going al desko, a state of bliss that was banned in the world we have left behind by overzealous office admins concerned about the carpets and the stains. The problem here is that a lunch box is sealed for hours, letting off the most offensive of smells the moment it is uncorked. So hold that sambhar and tuna for dinner at home. While you are it, not a bad idea to go easy on the chomping sounds too. It may signal spontaneity to your spouse but is not music to anyone else’s ears.

Finally, of course there is that last option. Just raid the executive lunch room hitherto reserved for the C-Suite. It is sure to be doubly sanitised with enough social distancing to make the virus feel it has stumbled upon an abandoned city. However, be warned. This is where you need sharp fork and knife skills, and you can’t gossip about your bosses.

Whatever the course you choose to follow, eating out is off so time to turn to the Japanese aisai bento, literally a lunch box made with love and care by one’s wife. For the sake of gender correctness, make that one’s spouse.

There’s also the ultimate forgotten luxury, the going home for lunch and a short siesta, a reminder of the good old days. That magnificent author and epicurean Khushwant Singh was known to drive home to his Sujan Singh Park apartment when he was editing a Delhi-based magazine in the late 1970s.

Oh and before I forget, this isn’t the time to navigate through the office cupboard for the right mug in which to have your morning coffee. It is strictly each one gets his own and preferably takes it back home in the evening to wash and sanitise. Indeed the time has come to get your own French Press because you never know who’s handled the office vending machine before you get there.

Sundeep Khanna is a senior journalist. Views are personal.