As I continue to process the end of my parasocial relationship with the hot TA from my second-year forestry class (she gave me a good grade so that has to mean something, right?), I reflect on my bubbe’s mystical saying: “Soup heals all wounds, so don’t bother seeking medical care, idiot.”

It’s basic biology that the human body needs a certain amount of salty liquid to live (I took BIOL 111 online during COVID). Heartbreak causes you to lose salty liquid in the form of tears, so it’s important to put it back in your body by drinking tons of broth.

I think that was what my professor said — my laptop speaker was garbled for all of 2020 after I spilled bisque on my keyboard. UBC: A Place of Mind, my ass!

So, for Mid Appétit, and the wellbeing of my soul, I guess, I ate nothing but different campus soups for a week. Here are the best spots to drown your sorrows.

Coconut Chicken Curry from The Smelly

This soup is a massive red flag. Moving on.

Tomato Soup from Dupe arket

This soup is basic — but not in a bad way. It’s a comforting classic with the vibe of something you would eat in a library, assuming you’re allowed to eat in a library, which you aren’t. But if you could eat soup in the library, this is the soup you’d have.

This one was a little more watery than anticipated. But hey, it’s a welcome counter to the dry conversations you’ve been having with your ex.

It’s customary to order grilled cheese with this particular soup, but that is outside the scope of this review.

Stew from Sprouch

When you get a bowl of stew from Sprouch, you can tell it came from a cauldron.

The earthenware bowls ooze primordial steam that somehow always smells the same, despite “menu changes.” Sprouch is the closest we have to a feudal village pub in our modern time, where a perpetual stew simmers under the watchful eyes of your toxic ex and a ghosted Singe match.

While the stew’s actual seasonings are often limited to a heavy hand of cumin, pepper and nutritional yeast, it gets its flavour from a not-so-secret ingredient: dyke drama.

Sprouch stew won’t heal your heartbreak. But, in the time it takes you to sip your comically large tureen of lentils, while you may not have gotten over your ex (difficult, considering they made and served you said stew), you’ll have found a rebound.

Sure, sometimes the beans aren’t soaked properly and hard chickpeas rattle around your mouth like pebbles, but the roughage builds character. There’s nothing like the sensory experience of licking a pit of gravel to prepare you for the emotional turmoil ahead (this rebound will be worse than your ex, trust).

On the bright side, your sorry tale will serve as a few hours of conversation and soup slurping for several of your closest friends and enemies­ — feeding the community with gossip (the most important meal of the day).

Ghormeh Sabzi and Gheymeh from Sawhell

Ghormeh sabzi is a Persian stew of herbs, shredded beef and kidney beans. Its rich green colour and sour tang of dried lime makes it feel both filling and refreshing. More importantly, its complex flavour profile provides a welcome distraction from the trials and tribulations of the heart.

Gheymeh is its sister stew — a brown lentil beef stew topped with strings of fried potatoes that, despite its different aesthetic to the Ghormeh, has a very similar dried lime-forward zing.

These soups, despite their different appearance, taste the same — a reminder that a universal sorrow lurks behind different faces, ready to come forth and inflict suffering and misery at any moment.

The Sprouch rebound did not help. Not at all.

Beef Stew from My Dorm Cuisine

The beef stew from My Dorm Cuisine ended my relationship. My wife checked my bank statement and thought I was cheating on her with someone named “Stu Beef,” short for Stuart Beef, because of how much money I drop on this soup monthly. I’m fine, though. Really. Now all the money I was spending on her yogalates classes can go straight back into the soup fund, baby.

I’m rich in the dish. A splendour of slurpage. Mountains of minestrone. Craving chicken noodle? I got caboodles of noodles. I got ramen on udon. I’m doing phoking great. I don’t even care anymore — more time and money for stew (and Stuart too)…