Soup tea is thing now.

I mean, it's been a thing in Asia for a while, but now it's taking off in Toronto too – just like our good friends activated charcoal, super-expensive melon and cheese-stuffed chicken as big as your face!

Not to be confused with sipping broth (which is also mad trendy as of late), soup tea is not really soup. It's tea.

The difference lies in how these respective savoury drinks are prepared.

Have you tried this yet? Soup Tea from @davidstea - surprisingly really good! This is Tomato Turmeric #davidstea #TomatoTurmeric #SoupTea #cuppa

A post shared by Lorena Sollows (@scrappingcorner) on Sep 29, 2017 at 5:41pm PDT

Broth is basically hot meat water and salt. It takes on the flavour of whatever's boiled in it. Much of what's being sold by the cup right now is "bone broth," which, while thought to have some health benefits, is often jam-packed with sodium. That's why it's so delicious.

Making the perfect cup of Broth with extra virgin olive oil, smoked black pepper and ground Turmeic root -

A post shared by Llance Kezner (@savoryteas) on Sep 12, 2017 at 6:12pm PDT

Soup tea, on the other hand, is made by steeping vegetables, herbs spices and green tea. You can buy it in tea bags, just like Eary Gray, from companies such as the U.S. based Millie's or Numi Organics, which sells savoury "garden" teas.

It also comes in loose-leaf form and can be purchased buy the cup at David's Tea, which has 17 locations across Toronto.

A post shared by Katja Alexander (@kittyxander) on Oct 4, 2017 at 8:44am PDT

David's set the trend on fire locally a few weeks ago when it rolled out its first three flavours of soup tea: Tomato Turmeric, Rosemary Black Pepper and Spicy Rasam.

The company's website says the product has "detoxifying" and "radiance-boosting" health benefits, as well as minerals like calcium and iron. But so do the many purveyors of bone broth.

What seems to make savoury teas more of a sell than broths, aside from having way less salt, is the relative ease in which they can be prepared, consumed and even cooked with.

Soup tea isn't just for soup! 🍜 Tofu scramble seasoned with @davidstea Spicy Rasam and what was tragically the last of @kenzieleightraill 's mom's salsa. 💔 #vegan #tofu #souptea #dtinsider #blackcatsofinstagram

A post shared by Caity (@annihilaity) on Oct 4, 2017 at 10:45am PDT

"Truthfully, making soup with tea isn't anything new," reads a Cooking Light blog post about David's new teas. "Other brands have tried similar versions... but what really gets us is the convenience of a full broth in a bag."

Apparently it's pretty tasty, too. Tea vloggers (which exist, if you didn't know,) seem to be eating this stuff up.

Of course, it could just be a novelty thing.

Hot take: Soup tea is just soup.

— Chris Webb 🌹 (@Cee_Webb) September 29, 2017

Confused comments seem to follow a lot of the people who post about their soup-tea habit online.

"I bought one each of the new soup teas. I'm excited to try them!" wrote one woman on Instagram, to which a commenter replied "Isn't this just soup in a cup?"

"I know I buy some hippie-skippy," wrote someone else on Instagram. "But " DO NOT want something called 'soup tea.'"

Suit yourself.