Canapés are one of life’s delights and surprises – surprises because drinks party invitations usually give nothing away. Perhaps because ‘nibbles’ is such a hideous word, or perhaps just because of invitation convention, hosts tend simply to put ‘Drinks, 6.30 to 8.30’ on the Paperless Post card. So you arrive with no idea whether you’re in for two hours of fizz on an empty stomach, or for a culinary treat in a succession of miniatures. Always braced for the worst-case scenario – starvation in high heels – I’m overjoyed to spot a tray of canapés coming towards me through the throng, and am pathetically grateful to the host for this beneficence. For women, especially, eternally trying not to eat too much, canapés enable the perfect combination of two hours of active greed, while still not having as much to eat as you normally would for supper.

‘Little bites of heaven’ is how caterers portray canapés in their publicity material; and they’re right. Written descriptions of the items, such as Emily Preece’s sublime miniature ‘Pork and nduja sausage rolls, bloody Mary ketchup’ don’t do justice to their mood-enhancing delectableness.

I’ve trained myself to hold back from grabbing a canapé too desperately when the tray comes round. I notice that the tactic of the unashamed is to be the first in the group of chatters to grab and gobble one up, so that by the time the last person has had one (especially if they come with a dip, so it all takes longer), the first one has finished his (it usually is a he), and says: ‘Ooh, may I have a second one?’ I worry about this double-gobbling, because the conventional allocation is 12 canapés per person, at about £2 to £2.75 per canapé. So that person who has just stuffed £5 into his mouth in those 15 seconds has already had a sixth of his evening’s allocation. For the whole thing to balance out, you need to count on a few thin women resolutely saying ‘no thank you’ for the entire evening.

What happens when the tray does arrive but there’s only one canapé left on it? Who takes it? One thing is certain: everyone wants it. But there’s usually a brief time of hesitation, during which a sort of dance takes place, the men politely saying ‘you first’ to the women, and the women knowing they couldn’t live with themselves if they succumbed to such a public act of greed. Usually, in the end, it’s the fattest of the men who pops it into his mouth with a gracious shrug.

The only thing that mars the canapés experience for me is the arrival of the sweet canapés, which have become fashionable. They’re the equivalent of the neon lights being switched on towards the end of a teenage disco: ‘Not much longer, folks!’ The imminent end of the party is signalled. There’s a strange hybrid time when the last of the savoury ones are still going round, and the first of the sweet ones have arrived, and you know that as soon as you’ve had your first sweet one, you can never, ever go back. To eat a miniature brownie at 8.15 p.m. is not only goodbye to the party, but also death to the evening ahead.

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