Granddad does the same on his side of the table, except his king is a jar of strawberry jam, his queen is blackcurrant jam and his bishops are his knife and fork, too. Then he says we should have two sauce bottles each for rooks and two gherkins for our knights.

‘Okay,’ he says. ‘Are you ready?’

‘Yes.’

‘Wonderful, now I will pick up a piece of bread and move it to e4.’

He moves the bread.

‘And what do I do?’ I ask.

‘You . . . You move your bread to c5.’

I pick up a ball of bread and move it as Granddad said.

‘Wonderful,’ says Granddad. ‘Now I move my gherkin to f3.’

Granddad moves his gherkin. I don’t know exactly what we are doing, but Granddad’s smile is as wide as mine feels.

‘Right,’ he says tapping another piece of my bread. ‘Now you move this to d6.’

‘This is weird, Granddad,’ I say.

‘I know. This is how my father taught me. With food like this and this exact cutlery, but we didn’t waste bread for our pawns. We used coins – Schillings and Marks.’

‘Was your dad really good at chess too?’ I ask.

‘Yes.’ Granddad moves his other gherkin to c3. ‘My father was one of the best . . . ’

‘So if he taught you, does that mean you are better than he was?’

Granddad tilts his head like he’s thinking about it.

‘I do not like to say. But possibly. I won the German youth championship when I was twelve.’

‘Wow! You must have been really good! Could you have beaten Bobby Fischer?’

‘Perhaps not, but I was okay.’ Granddad ignores my question and tells me to move my bread to d6. ‘I played all through school,’ he continues. ‘At first I was rubbish like you.’

‘Ha, thanks!’

‘Sorry, but it is true. I was very much like you. I couldn’t sit still or concentrate. But chess helped me at school and I got quite good at it. Now cut your sausage.’

I cut my sausage.

‘Where do I move it, Granddad?’

‘Nowhere,’ he says, grinning. ‘Just eat it!’

I laugh and put the sausage in my mouth. It’s so good to be back in the house with Granddad talking about growing up. He’s been my granddad all my life, but now it’s like I’m really getting to know him for the first time.

I cut another piece of sausage and we keep eating while we move our mustard, bread and gherkins all over the invisible board.

‘So why did you stop playing?’ I ask as we play.

Granddad stares at the board like he’s made a wrong move. I wonder if he’s ignoring me, or just didn’t hear me.

‘Granddad,’ I say, leaning across the table. ‘If you loved chess so much and you were so good, why did you stop playing?’