We tried the 'edible alcohol' that's meant to replace cocktails - but had incredibly mixed feelings about it

Mark Matousek / Business Insider

We had mixed feelings about Smith & Sinclair's edible cocktails.

• Smith & Sinclair makes edible cocktails that are based on drinks made from rum, whisky, vodka, and gin.
• Each edible cocktail has the alcohol content of half of a shot.
• While we found the idea interesting, we had mixed feelings about them overall.

To many people, the idea of "edible alcohol" is limited to homemade jello shots or gummy bears soaked in vodka that never quite turn out the way you hoped. Smith & Sinclair hopes to change that.

The idea behind the London-based startup grew out of a "date night" event that the company's founders, Melanie Goldsmith and Emile Bernard, held for singles. At the event, they used board games as a way to break the ice, but they found that people had a difficult time holding drinks while playing the games.

Bernard started experimenting with jelly-based, edible cocktail recipes that would be less cumbersome than traditional drinks. The edible cocktails were a hit at the date nights, which led Goldsmith and Bernard to turn their experiment into a business.

Now, their company, Smith & Sinclair, sells edible cocktails in eight flavors and ships them around the world. We tried each flavor to see if they could replace cocktails.

See what we had to say below.