Kitchen gadgets review – edible shot glasses: a dignity-stripping pain in the stomach

Give it a shot: armed and dangerous, with Prezzybox’s edible glasses. Photograph: Martin Godwin for the Guardian

What

These edible gummy shot glasses (£6.95, Prezzybox.com) are thick-set gelatine receptacles. They hold a small quantity of liquid, which may be drunk before the consumption of the containers.

Why?

Nothing says you own the party like pulling out the props of an alcoholic clown.

Down the hatch: remember, only use the glass once. Photograph: Martin Godwin for the Guardian

Well?

“Pour. Drink. Eat. Party,” the box commands, like some demented club rep. Do I have to? I have tried edible shot glasses before. I know they reek of organised fun and student drink deals, a feather boa trailing in a puddle and a man I don’t know roaring, “What happens in Swansea STAYS in Swansea,” full-blast in my ear. We weren’t even in Swansea. The website lists the product’s best features, starting with “perfectly usable shot glasses,” which is not reassuring. It comes as a set of four – strawberry, blueberry, apple and pineapple. You are encouraged to shoot your drinks quickly when poured, use the glasses only once, and then eat them.

For authenticity, I am pairing them with an exciting drink called Cactus Jack’s Schnapps: an apple sour-flavoured mixed-alcohol potion that is the exact colour of kryptonite. I pour out a jelly cup of leprechaun’s revenge, and knock it back. It’s like I have spilled nail varnish remover inside myself. I dutifully eat my glass, chewing heavily, like a cow. The potent beef gelatine/glucose syrup hit is a suitable chaser for the shot of emerald regret, but hardly sophisticated. I pour another, this time pairing it with the apple-flavoured glass. I experience a shooting pain in my stomach. I go again, because I am already drunk. Unsurprisingly, the experiment yields no new conclusions.

Chew on it: that’s the first one done – only three more to go. Photograph: Martin Godwin for the Guardian

Edible shot glasses are horrendous. They are the beginning of a night out that will end in the Revolution bar in Swansea, no matter where you started; a night characterised by blackouts so prolonged you will only be able to piece together its narrative by reading the bruises on your own body, like a screening of the film Memento sponsored by WKD. If that’s your thing, I salute you. I had to go to bed at 6pm and listen to a Radio 4 documentary about kestrels. Damn you, Cactus Jack, and the shot glasses you rode in on. Pour. Drink. Eat. Party. Stop. Feel unwell. Lie down. Have some restorative tea, from a mug, made of porcelain. Accept your youth is gone. Be thankful.

Any downsides?

If you count comprehensive loss of dignity as a downside, then yes.

Counter, drawer, back of the cupboard?

Edible shit glasses. 1/5