Earlier this month we learned about a German-based company offering an eco-friendly single-use cup by making them out of terracotta. It’s one of the more creative solutions to the problem that we’ve seen in a while (even if it is based on a 5,000-year-old tradition from South India). And now, there’s a new option looking to take a bite out of the disposable cup problem. Literally. Good-Edi out of Australia is a coffee cup that you can eat.
As reported by Bloomberg, Good-Edi is a Melbourne-based company started by Aniyo Rahebi and Catherine Hutchins, who have spent two decades in food processing and packaging, who in 2021 came together to design a packaging that is also food. After spending hundreds of hours in the kitchen—creating no less than 250 recipes and adjustments—the duo ultimately landed on a combination of rye, wheat and oat brans, sugar, salt, coconut oil, and water. The result is a crispy edible cup that can hold hot coffee without falling apart or leaking for 40 minutes and cold drinks for eight hours.
Per Bloomberg, the taste of the cups is akin to an “unsweetened wheat biscuit,” which I believe they mean that in the British/European sense of the word, not the flaky-caky American sense. Hutchins states that the flavor is intentionally understated: “We deliberately didn’t make it sweet because we didn’t want to impact the flavor of the coffee.” And Good-Edi does have a cup dipped in chocolate for those looking for a sweet kick, with more flavor options in the works.
With clients all around Australia, including coffee shops, roasteries, and even concert venues, the issue Good-Edi faces right now is scale. Currently, they are able to produce 500 cups a day; an estimated 2.7 disposable cups find their way to the landfill in Australia alone, so there’s a lot of room for growth. The company already has their sites set beyond their home country and are hoping to expand internationally to become a larger part of the 250 billion disposable cups used each year.
And for those of you wondering: no, you don’t have to eat the cup if you don’t want to. Good-Edi states that their cups are home compostable and should they find their way to a landfill, they will break down in two to six weeks.
But really, why would you want to throw it away? With Good-Edi, you can have your cake and eat it to, assuming that your cake is coffee. Oooo I wonder if they could make one out of coffee cake.
Zac Cadwalader is the managing editor at Sprudge Media Network and a staff writer based in Dallas. Read more Zac Cadwalader on Sprudge.
