KATIE VOICEOVER: From the moment you get dressed in the morning, get in your car.

Can I get a cold brew?

KATIE VOICEOVER: And pick up you morning latte, or maybe your morning Big Gulp, you are surrounded by plastic.

Hello?

You can't even eat breakfast without plastic.

And all this packaging is a big source of waste.

KATIE VOICEOVER: It's more likely to pile up in our landfills than it is to get recycled.

KATIE VOICEOVER: I'm Katie Herzog.

Good mouth feel.

Oaky finish.

KATIE VOICEOVER: Today, we're visiting a scientist who's taking on the future of plastic waste.

So you think you have a plan to reduce food packaging waste.

I do.

And what is your idea?

One of the ways using edible packaging.

Edible packaging.

Edible packaging, basically it's made using all the material edible, like food ingredients.

All right, science.

Yeah, science.

Magic.

[upbeat music] All right, so what do we have here?

Fruit roll, or sometimes called fruit leather.

You can see, after you open them, you have those plastic wraps, right?

So this is plastic.

It's plastic, and you have to throw away.

That's a waste, right?

Good.

So what you can do is, you can roll your fruits here, right?

It's preventing sticky, then you can just eating them together.

Just give a try.

All right, so just the-- Yeah.

All right.

You can bite them.

Mmm, not bad.

Yeah, thank you.

Not bad at all.

KATIE VOICEOVER: Zhao says it probably won't replace all plastic food packaging, but it could replace a lot of the packaging within packaging.

String cheese, instant coffee, instant oatmeal.

The seasoning in your ramen noodle.

Those bags that keep your cereal fresh.

Plastic bags on fruits and veggies.

The plastic that protects your chicken breast.

All of that packaging could be consumed with your food.

Yeah, so how far could we take this?

What's the future of edible food packaging?

Yes, then let's look at the other options as a fruit coating.

KATIE VOICEOVER: Strawberries, bananas, pears, and then she watched to see if a recipe would make the food last longer.

We did try in the lab, they worked very, very well for extending shelf life.

So these are the same age?

Same age.

All right, this one looks fresher.

Let's try it.

Pretty good.

Yeah.

I'd eat that.

I did eat that.

So how realistic is this?

Are we actually going to be eating our food packaging someday?

Maybe.

Researchers around the world are looking for the perfect recipe to make plastic food packaging disappear.

Some are using milk protein to make an alternative to plastic wrap.

Others have used gelatin to make edible blobs that could replace our water bottles.

KFC recently tried serving its coffee in a cup made out of a cookie, which means even if we're not eating big packaging like this, we could be throwing away less plastic and eating our way to a cleaner planet.

ANNOUNCER: This program is made possible by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.

All right, Carl.

Where are we and what is going on here?

Well, we're in the reactor room at Northwest Nuclear Laboratories.

Which is?

Also my basement.

Gotcha.