Inspired by countless nights spent studying in school, an eco-conscious college grad has come up with an ingenious replacement for the single-use plastics used to package instant ramen noodles.

Holly Grounds, who studied product design at Ravensbourne University London, is responsible for developing an edible, spiced packaging film for instant noodles.

Grounds says she felt compelled to develop her "Dissolvable Noodle Packaging" after realizing the long-lasting environmental consequences of such a quick and easy meal.

"In the current world of instant ramen noodles, there is often more plastic than noodle," Grounds wrote on her website. "The product can be cooked and eaten in under 10 minutes, yet the packaging can take 8 decades to decompose."

After countless hours of trial and error testing, Grounds managed to simultaneously do away with both the plastic noodle sleeves and the single-use spice packets by incorporating the seasoning into the biofilm packaging.

While the biofilm is thick enough to keep the noodles from getting stale, it melts into ramen broth exactly one minute after coming into contact with boiling water.

Grounds says she can produce the film simply by mixing potato starch, glycerin, and water with the seasonings and pouring the concoction into a mould so that it can set for 24 hours. Once solidified, she uses the film to wrap the noodles into a donut shape for even heating on the stovetop. For hygiene purposes, Grounds then bundles the meal into a paper wrapper.

Not only is Grounds's invention more environmentally friendly than consumer packaging, it also takes less time to cook and prepare because it eliminates the need to tear open the different plastic sleeves.

Since the edible noodle wrapper was featured as one of five finalists in Dezeen's circular economy-themed Virtual Design Festival in June, Grounds now hopes that she can use the media attention to help implement the biofilm packaging in other food packaging schemes as well.

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