À table, l'addition

This is the third and last of the food sessions, and by now you can order, eat and pay. What is left is the part nobody writes down.

The order is not negotiable

Cheese comes before dessert. Not after, not instead of, before. Offering a cheeseboard after something sweet reads at a French table roughly the way serving soup after pudding would read at an English one.

Nor is cheese a course you skip lightly when it is offered. Taking a small piece of one or two is polite; declining entirely is fine but noticed.

Hands

Both hands stay visible, resting on the table, wrists on the edge. Keeping one in your lap, which is correct in Britain and America, reads in France as though you are hiding something. This is a genuine, centuries-old convention rather than a superstition, and older French people notice it immediately.

Bread

No side plate. Bread goes on the cloth beside your plate. You tear it rather than cutting it, and using a piece to push food onto your fork or to clean sauce off the plate is good manners, not bad.

Wine

You do not fill your own glass without offering to fill everyone else's first. You do not fill a glass to the top; somewhere between a third and a half. And santé or tchin-tchin is said with eye contact, which is taken seriously enough that avoiding someone's eyes over a toast is a small insult.

Paying

L'addition, s'il vous plaît. Service is included, so a tip is optional and small. Splitting the bill item by item is unusual and mildly disliked; the French tend to divide it evenly or to have one person pay and settle up later.

On paie ? at the table means shall we settle up. C'est moi qui invite means this is on me, and is the polite way to insist.