Costa Rica is the first Latin American country to have the tasty utensils that were originally created in Spain to change the culture of excessive plastic consumption.
Federico Guth, the distributor of Sorbos in Costa Rica, spoke to the Tico Times about how the edible straws ended up here. In 2016, Guth’s daughter questioned him after he had used a plastic straw at a restaurant. “I kept thinking about what would happen if there were other options to not use so much plastic and be able to use straws.”
In his search, he found Sorbos, a Spanish family-owned business founded by Víctor Manuel Sánchez, a young bartender who invented a kind of wafer made of cassava starch that worked perfectly in the cocktails he enjoyed.
How many plastic straws do you use per day? A week? A month? These small tubes represent 4 percent of garbage worldwide. Each one takes years to decompose and, according to Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO), at least 90 percent of marine species have consumed one. Perhaps now there is a suitable alternative.
Although the flavors of Sorbos range from chocolate to lemon, its flavors do not contaminate your drink until after you start eating the straw. A Sorbos straw is made from gelatin, cassava starch, sugar and water. It is hard and, after being immersed in a drink, remains usable for about half an hour. If it is not eaten, it fully degrades in hours. The colder the drink, the better Sorbos works.
Although the flavors of Sorbos range from chocolate to lemon, its flavors do not contaminate your drink until after you start eating the straw. A Sorbos straw is made from gelatin, cassava starch, sugar and water. It is hard and, after being immersed in a drink, remains usable for about half an hour. If it is not eaten, it fully degrades in hours. The colder the drink, the better Sorbos works.
