"Dinner, Bath, or Sex" Offer

Welcome back, honey! Now what would you like? Dinner? A bath? Or perhaps... me?

— Loving wife, to her husband

A character, usually a housewife but almost Always Female, offers her partner three choices; traditionally, it's either meal, bath or sex. Downplayed examples may ignore the offer of sex, while Exaggerated examples may offer multiple partners, or show up in a Naked Apron.

As this trope has its basis in an old Japanese custom^note its name in Japan is "shinkon santaku", roughly meaning "newlywed's three choices" (which is likely to get parodied nowadays), this trope is fairly common in hentai and Ecchi, particularly Rom Coms and Harem Genre anime. In modern comedies the protagonist will often either choose one of the options that isn't sex or ignore the question entirely; it's not uncommon for the person being asked the question to not reciprocate the girl's feelings at all. Alternately, in a raunchier sort of comedy they may choose all three at the same time.

Merely making the offer implies the submissive/dominant roles of the relationship between the characters, because the submissive is ready for "anything" asked of them. In exaggerated or parodic examples, the third option may be Punctuated! For! Emphasis! in a suggestive and often sing-song way. Only giving one option doesn't qualify, unless it's a Morton's Fork where each option leads to the same result. Another part of this trope is that it is also often practiced by Insatiable Newlyweds or Sickeningly Sweethearts, and played for maximum glurge that ends up giving their colleagues and acquaintances cuteness overloads and/or jealousy.

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Examples

Anime, Light Novel, and Manga

• In Ai Yori Aoshi, Aoi says this during an Imagine Spot by Kaoru. Inside it, it didn't matter which choice he picked, because he gets her no matter what.
• In Beastars, Louis makes light of Legoshi eating his leg earlier while recovering in the hospital by offering him three choices; two types of food, and the third option being 'me'. The line could be read either way, as a Double Entendre or a tease about Legoshi's predation.
• In Black Bullet, Enju tries to offer choices to Rentaro while wearing nothing but a Modesty Towel. Rentaro's response is to implore her to Please Put Some Clothes On.
• In Book of Bantorra, Hamyuts Meseta asks if Mallatast (who she considers her "boytoy") wants "dinner, bath, or me?". Mallatast chooses the sex, and Bridal Carries her to their bedroom.
• In one of the Fate/kaleid liner PRISMA☆ILLYA Blu-Ray specials, Sella gets bullied by Irisviel into doing this for Shirou. She's terrified and humiliated to begin with, but Shirou choosing "dinner" is the last straw.
• Digimon Adventure tri. features a G rated variant, where Tentomon wears an apron and asks Koushiro if he wants dinner or a bath first.
• The Familiar of Zero: When Siesta invokes her right to use Saito for a day, she sets up a newlywed scenario and tries this on him. However, when reaches "bath" she then realises that about half the school's maids are eavesdropping and stops to drive them away, then tries to finish as if nothing happened. Saito chooses dinner.
• The Fruit of Grisaia: In the anime, Amane tries to offer choices to Yuuji, but before she's even finished he bluntly states, "I'll have a shower" and walks straight past her.
• Ichaicha Suru to Okane ga Waichau Futari no Hanashi: Hanasaki fantasizes about asking Aki this when he gets home, with him interrupting her with a Wall Pin of Love before she gets to the last one.
• In KonoSuba, one member of the Axis Cult does this to troll Kazuma, asking "Are you here for conversion? Baptism? Or are you here for me?" Kazuma is dumbfounded before she laughs and tells him she was joking, while Kazuma rages on the inside and wishes he could punch her.
  • In the Explosion spinoff, Cecily does this to Megumin by offering her either a bath, her or an Axis conversion.
• In Love Hina, Mutsumi gets a crack on the head and her personality reverts to being five years old. She offers a choice that implies sex while "playing house" with Keitaro, making him and Naru wonder whether she's screwing with them or not.
• In The Maid I Hired Recently Is Mysterious, Lilith makes such an offer to Yuuri when he fails to respond to her usual teasing. She then immediately panics, thinking she's gone too far, but Yuuri just sighs and walks off, prompting Lilith to ask whether he's fallen ill.
• In Miss Caretaker of Sunohara-sou, Yuzu describes to Aki the kind of wife she wants to be and has a daydream where she welcomes home her husband with this exact phrase. However, after noticing Aki fidgeting, she adds "Or maybe you can eat my bath scrubbers instead!" while throwing them at Aki's head.
• Miss Kobayashi's Dragon Maid: The second chapter of Kanna's Daily Life opens with Tohru asking Kobayashi if she wants "a maid, a dragon, or her". Kobayashi points out that none of those are real options.
• Monster Musume: Exaggerated when the Lamia girl Miia gives the "food, bath, or me?" offer complete with the Naked Apron to her exchange program host Kimihito (wearing a Salary Man outfit) in one of her Imagine Spots. The response (she imagined) was "I'll have YOU for dinner IN the bath, Miia!", and we get a shot of him doing her on the bathtub still wearing her apron while he's still wearing his Salary Man uniform.
• Nekopara: Occurs three times in the TV Series.
  • Cinnamon puts on a play for Caocao using the Mama and Papa Bear dolls, with the Mama Bear offering him dinner, bath, or "something else...Like bathing me!"
  • While the catgirls are sharing stories during a storm. Vanilla tells an expansion of the story Chocola told about them living together in a gingerbread house with the latter receiving this offer from the former upon returning home from work.
  • A flashback of Shigure's Big Brother Attraction shows her giving Kashou this offer. He chooses "bath." She tries to join him but gets thrown out almost comically.
• In No Game No Life, when Fil returns to the exiled Kurami with a bag of ISO-Standard Urban Groceries while the latter is taking a bath:
  Fil: Do you want information? Food? Or... [removes her hood] ...me?
  Kurami: [smiling] Clothes first, I think.
• Nurse Hitomi's Monster Infirmary: In Chapter 6, when Tatara is telling her to "take it [her lab coat] off and put an apron on," Hitomi has an Imagine Spot of her in a Naked Apron making this offer. In a later chapter, she does the same thing as part of a dream sequence.
• Nyaruko: Crawling with Love!: Exaggerated; Nyaruko offers Mahiro three choices, all of which are her:
  "You must've had a hard day at work. Would you like to start with me? Or would you prefer me first? Or maybe you'd like... me?"
• Overlord (2012): Albedo pulls this on Ainz (clearly hoping for the third one), before realizing she forgot to do so wearing only an apron and begs for Ainz' forgiveness. As Ainz is a walking skeleton and thus incapable of reciprocating, it makes no difference to him either way. The fact that he unintentionally rewrote her settings to be this way towards him is also a factor in his not wanting to take advantage of her.
• The Pet Girl of Sakurasou: Subverted by Misaki in the first episode as she offers Sorata dinner, bath, or.... underwear. ^note The word is "ma-wa-shi" — a sumo wrestler's loincloth — an intentional corruption of "Watashi" ("Me"). She also tries "tawashi", a scrubbing brush — Sorata implores her to get to the "Watashi" part already.
• In Plastic Memories, Isla makes Tsukasa such an offer in The Stinger of Episode 6. Played for Laughs in that she got the idea from Tsukasa's book of romantic advice, and clearly doesn't understand what she's saying.
• Puella Magi Madoka Magica: The Different Story: In the preface to Puella Magi Madoka Magica: The Different Story, Homura suggests re-branding the spinoff as a Romantic Comedy in order to appeal to the audience, complete with an Imagine Spot of Madoka offering the choice, although Homura interrupts, choosing Madoka before she finishes.
• Saki: The title character subtly suggests sex in Kyoutaro's imagine spot of Nodoka in episode 4.
  "Welcome home darling. Would you like something to eat? Or maybe a bath? Or perhaps..."
• She's My Knight: Nikaido has Mogami and Ichinose both say this to the other while wearing an apron, to tell which one of them is the shoujo manga hero and which is the heroine. Ichinose is too bashful to say the whole phrase.^note Keep in mind they're high schoolers.
• Strike the Blood: Subverted. While Kojou Akatsuki is aboard another vampire lord's boat. Several bikini-clad women introduce themselves as maids and offer to wash his back. When he refuses, they offer to wash his front, which he refuses even harder. He questions whether they actually are maids, and they reveal the subversion: they're political hostages from foreign lands, trying to seduce him so that they'd become pregnant with the child of the most powerful vampire in the world, which would guarantee them political status.
• Student Council's Discretion: Mafuyu, while play-acting as Sugisaki's wife in Lv. 2, goes from offering food or a bath to offering him sex with the older guy, Nakameguro.
  "Welcome home, Darling. Will you start with dinner? Or a bath? Or... Nakameguro-sempai?"
• In To Love Ru, Yui has an Imagine Spot of her and Rito being married, where future Rito comes home and future Yui greets him by asking "Would you like dinner? Or a bath first?" before Rito asks for "a welcome home kiss". At which point Yui snaps out of her daydream in horror.
• In Whispered Words, Sumika fantasizes about Ushio becoming a housewife and offering her a choice that includes sex.
• In Yubisaki Milk Tea, Hidari once greets her father when he came home by offering him dinner, bath, or herself. He decides to go to bed, instead.

Fan Works

• In Izuku's Pro Hero Harem Life!, Ochako and Momo surprise Izuku with one of these. In nothing but aprons, no less.

Literature

• Coffee, Tea, or Me?, a book about the airline industry in the 1960s, discusses this trope, putting the offer in the title.

Live-Action Television

• In Being Human (UK) season 3, Annie makes the "Coffee, tea, or me" offer to Mitchell. She's only teasing him; however, the characters are aware that it is a cliche, and he picks coffee.
• Not the Nine O'Clock News: Subverted in a parody of Sheena Easton's 1981 hit, "Morning Train", in which grumpy tired husband Rowan Atkinson arrives home to his wife "Sheena Easton" only for her to burst into song at him about what a good wife she is. (The My Baby Takes the Morning Train song). Rowan Atkinson cannot help but strangle her.
• In Picket Fences episode "Bad Moon Rising", a scantily-clad woman in Matthew's dream offers "Chocolate cake, Game Boy, and me."

Music

• Skyhooks' "Women In Uniform":
  Flying to my hometown on a seven-forty-seven
  Stewardess made me feel like I'm in heaven
  Looking up the aisle trying to see what I could see
  She leaned over and said "Coffee, tea or me?"

Radio

• The Burkiss Way: Subverted in a sketch written by Douglas Adams. Ghenghiz Khan, at the end of a hard day's pillaging, finds a house with three women in it who are completely at his mercy. Ghenghis is exasperated when they offer him what they think he wants. He has to patiently explain what will fulfill his needs, and the quickest learner begins to nag, berate and browbeat him as if he is an errant husband arriving late from the office. The mighty ruler of the fates of millions sighs contentedly and relaxes...

Video Games

• Ar nosurge: Ode to an Unborn Star: In Nay's Mental World where Cass and Delta are a married couple:
  "More importantly, what would you like to do first tonight? Dinner? Bath? Or.. a scrubber?"

  (where "scrubber", tawashi, is a anagram of "me", watashi. Choosing this option lands you with washing the dishes.)

• Azur Lane: Taihou being Taihou, she combines this with But Thou Must! in one of her secretary lines:
  (to the Commander)Would you like to take a bath with me? Would you like to eat me? Or... would you like to do~ it~ with~ me~? Ahahaha!
• In Ensemble Stars!, Hinata jokingly says this to Tetora as a welcome, just as part of him being overly outgoing and audacious. (Tetora basically ignores him.)
• Eternal Sonata: A Downplayed trope in the bonus dungeon "Mysterious Unison". There is a soul orb called Mute who offers your party the choice of a shower first, or if you want to eat. If you choose Shower and have enough Gold, your party is healed. If you choose Eat and have the max amount of Gold of 99,999,999, then your party is granted a Soul Shard item, one of seven found in the dungeon.
• Time and Eternity: In order to gauge how strong the bond between the soon-to-be-married main couple is, a guardian asks them a question. The guardian basically asks which would the guy choose after coming home; food, a bath, or his blushing bride. With the guardian being a Dirty Old Man, the correct answer is the guy's bride.
• KanColle: Houshou, one of the light carrier girls, says this in one of her secretary lines, fitting for her motherly personality.
  (to the Admiral) You must be tired. Would you like a meal? The bath? Or... fufu, just kidding.
• Girls' Frontline has Kalina greet you on the premium cash shop with a variation:
  (to the Commander) Would you like a meal? The bath? Or... MAYBE SHOPPING?
• Parodied in a scene in the bonus story of Salem in Fate/Grand Order. It features Princess Iron Fan (played by Nightingale) and Ox-Demon King (played by Altria Lancer Alter) in a play inspired by Journey to the West:
  Princess Iron Fan: Oh my, oh my, if it isn't my honey.
  Ox-Demon King: Your honey!?
  Princess Iron Fan: Ahh, what a momentous occasion it is to see you here in my Plantain Cave on Jade Cloud Mountain. Tell me, what brings you here? Are you feeling ill? Would you like to have dinner? A bath? Or perhaps... some peroxide?
• Takeshi's Challenge has several options, three of which follow this trope (even though it isn't said outright, they're still 3 choices), being "FOOD", "BATH", and "LET'S GO TO BED".

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