Will Your Situationship Turn Into A Relationship? The 'Soup Test' Might Hold The Answer.
When you’re stuck in a situationship, you may find yourself wondering where you stand. Does the person you’re dating see a potential future with you, or are you just the flavor of the month?
A viral concept called the “soup test” claims to provide the clarity you’re seeking.
The soup test was coined by Ophira Odem and her sister when they were in their early 20s. Odem, a 27-year-old artist and poet living in New Orleans, recently posted about it on the app Threads.
The premise is this: You make the person you’re casually dating “something nice to eat as a gift,” like a soup, banana bread or home-cooked meal, and then gauge their reaction, Odem explained in the post. The person will either be freaked out and quickly break things off or they’ll be touched, and it’s a sign the relationship has potential, she said.
“For some reason, it expedites everything and lets you know if they value you or not,” Odem wrote.
The soup test was inspired by a moment in Odem’s sister’s dating history. Five years ago, she made chicken noodle soup for a guy she was seeing who was under the weather and dropped it off at his house.
“They cut things off that night. He told her something along the lines of ‘she was too invested’ and ‘he still wanted to keep his options open and get numbers when he went to the bar’ — stupid shit like that,” Odem wrote.
In a follow-up post, she clarified that the point of the soup test is to “get out of the confusing pre-relationship grey area.”
“If they care about you — they’ll view it as a green flag and love it,” she said. “And if they view you as a temporary situationship, they’ll end it.”
Threads users replied with examples of the soup test playing out in their own lives.
“Got an expensive bottle of whiskey for a situationship who was really into whiskey. He got weird and even mean after that,” one person wrote. “Another situationship got weird when 3 months in, I cooked a 3-course birthday dinner for him. Plus a birthday cake AND gifts. I don’t get why they put so much work into pursuing then when you start to care, they turn into complete assholes.”
Another offered up their experience as someone on the other side of the equation: “Broke up with my last girlfriend after she tried to cook a meal for me in my flat after looking after my pet while I was away. She thought it would be a sweet thing for when I got home, I felt like it was part of a pattern of her trying to make my space ‘our’ space and over-inserting herself into my life. So I guess this is anecdotal evidence from the other side that ‘the soup test’ works. Still feel like an arsehole.”
And while there are many examples of soup test failures, there were some happy endings, too.
“I once brought baked goods to a guy I had been casually dating for 2 months. He never thanked me for them and instead broke things off the next day saying I was ‘too serious,’” one Threads user wrote. “Years later, I made chili for a guy I was recently seeing and he gushed over how nice it was and how much he liked it. We celebrated 2 years of being married last month.”
In an email to HuffPost, Odem called the response to her Threads post “massive” and “overwhelming, but a lot of fun.”
What makes the soup test effective, she believes, is that it’s a “symbolic gesture of effort and energy.”
It also shows your potential partner, “Hey, I care about you enough to want to nurture you, to want to care for you,” Odem said, adding that it’s “not to be manipulative.”
“Ultimately, you are trying to figure out whether or not this person is for you, maybe not forever, maybe not for marriage, but literally just looking ahead at next steps,” Odem said. “Do they want more of you, or do they want less?”
There’s also a bit of a Goldilocks element to all of this, with Odem noting that it probably wouldn’t make sense to surprise the person you’re dating with a pot of soup too soon or too late.
“If you’ve been on one or two dates with someone, that’s way too early. You don’t even know if you like them, let alone trying to figure out if this is something that’s relationship material,” she said.
And if you’ve been seeing each other a while — say six months — and you’re basically acting like you’re in a relationship minus the official title, you’d need to have a more serious “define the relationship” conversation versus relying on a food-related gesture, Odem said.
If they care about you — they’ll view it as a green flag and love it. And if they view you as a temporary situationship, they’ll end it.Ophira Odem, artist
Anecdotally, it seems that the act of gifting a casual interest a loaf of pumpkin bread might help illuminate where you stand in a situationship. But therapist Nicole Saunders has some reservations about folks using a gesture like this as a test.
“A ‘situationship’ is already a vague, purgatory-level relationship status,” Saunders, owner of Therapy Charlotte in North Carolina, told HuffPost. “Trying to shift that dynamic with an equally unclear ‘soup test’ gimmick might get a reaction, but does it really provide clarity? If you’re not being authentic and communicating directly, how can you truly know what the other person is responding to?”
In other words, whether the person responds in a positive or negative way, it’s hard to draw helpful conclusions from their reaction, Saunders explained.
“They might simply appreciate what they see as an act of kindness — even though it’s really a trick,” she said. “Or they might find the gesture strange and out of context. Like, ‘Why is she bringing me soup? I hate soup.’ It’s an odd risk to take and could easily add awkwardness to an already uncertain relationship.”
Her advice? If you really want to gauge the other person’s interest, have an honest conversation.
“If you’re not quite ready to talk but want to show more intimacy or relationship-oriented behavior, do so genuinely — not as a test,” Saunders said. “People can often sense when they’re being tested, and it’s usually off-putting.”
Having a straightforward discussion may feel emotionally risky and uncomfortable. But that kind of vulnerable communication is “essential for building healthy relationships,” Saunders added.
