It’s September now. The days are getting shorter, the nights are getting colder and pretty much every vacant indoor space has been hastily converted into a Spirit Halloween. The fall weather also marks the beginning of soup season, thus reigniting the age old debate: Is soup really a meal?
This question was first posed en masse by Seinfeld, which, come to think of it, had a surprising number of soup-themed episodes.
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In Season Six’s “The Soup,” Jerry reluctantly accepts an Armani suit from hack comedian Kenny Bania in exchange for a meal at a nice restaurant. They meet up for dinner at Mendy’s, Jerry orders the salmon for himself, but Bania opts to get soup and “save” the meal for another time. An irate Jerry argues that the soup is still a meal. His logic is later interrogated by Elaine, who proposes that Bania’s consommé shouldn’t be considered a meal because it’s not a “hardy soup” like “chicken gumbo or matzah ball or mushroom barley.” But she concedes that it could be considered a meal once Bania crumbled crackers into it.
While Jerry’s main objection to Bania’s logic is that the act of sitting with him in a restaurant should in and of itself count as a meal, the soup-meal debate has moved well beyond the confines of the show. Even now, 30 years later, people are still squabbling over the correct classification of soup.
Some say that “soup isn’t a meal unless it’s thick and creamy.” Others have pointed out that “soup can have all your food groups covered in one shot.” According to the Los Angeles Times, the “soup-for-dinner diet” is an “easy, delicious way to lose weight.” So if people are having it for dinner every single night, it must be a meal, right? Then again, is it really just an appetizer?
Earlier this year, Merriam-Webster tried to settle the matter once and for all by pointing out that a meal is defined as “an act or the time of eating a portion of food to satisfy appetite,” and therefore, “soup is technically a meal.”
But then again, the real-life Mendy’s, the New York deli that served as the inspiration for Bania’s favorite eatery, appears to side with the comedian/Ovaltine enthusiast. They sell soup, but with half of a sandwich, as part of their Seinfeld-themed offerings. It’s literally advertised with the slogan: “Soup and half a sandwich, now that’s a meal!”
Perhaps the best argument that soup should count as a meal was made by a later episode of Seinfeld. “The Soup Nazi” suggests that soup can be so satisfying and filling that one’s knees can’t help but buckle afterwards. Even Bania would have to admit that these soups qualify as meals.
In retrospect, it’s odd that Jerry never brought this up with him at the time.
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