Enter a café in Prague these days and you may just find your favourite beverage served in an edible cup.
Made from pastry, they can hold drinks up to 85°C and last for 12 hours.
And the covid crisis has boosted demand, as reusable glass and china cups are no longer permitted.
They are the invention of two Czech students: Zuzana Zverova and Miroslav Myroncuk.
“The cup is produced mainly from oat bran,” says Zuzana. “And it is slightly sweet and tastes like a good healthy snack.”
Recipe took one year to develop
Studying economics at the Newton College in Prague the couple decided to establish their own startup.
“The project “Eatable cup” has been created at our university when we went with friends for coffee and saw how much paper and plastic we are using every day,” she says. “We decided to live more ecologically and invent the method ‘drink up and eat’ ”.
Their first experiments started two years ago in a small apartment kitchen. It took them more than one year to find the right combination of flour, starch, baking powder and eggs. The second stage was to get technical and financial support for their project.
“The technical university in Prague recommended us to use an EU grant for science and research which helped us to develop our own production technology and also our own recipe,” says Miroslav.
The project is also now a topic for their diploma. Already more than 50 Czech cafés are using their tasty ecological cups and more are joining every day.
Zuzana and Miroslav are now trying to create a new beer mug that tastes like cheese or bacon.