Designboom, a mod blog devoted to the latest and greatest in product design, recently came out with the winners of its 2006 Dining in 2015 contest. The challenge was exactly as it sounds: to design a food-related product that would be useful in 2015 at work, in travel, or at home.

Chefs and designers from Italy and Japan judged the entires and came up with the top three and an honorable mention.

Let's start from the bottom and work up. The honorable mention [ed. note: shown in photo] was an eco-friendly solution to dinner prep: silicone and nylon triangle-shaped buckets that allow the cook to boil three different foods all in one pot, thereby saving energy, time, and water. I totally expect it to be selling out on QVC in no time.

Third place? A creative ceramic salt and pepper shaker that forces you to physically break open the canister to access the spices inside. The goal of the project? There isn't any, really, but we bet it's really, really fun to break open. Save it for a day when you're really pissed off at someone, and then smash away. (But don't get carried away - - then you'll just have a mess of salt, pepper, and white ceramic shards to clean up).


Second place is a fun, cute design that really just gives you a new reason to chew on your pen: the designers came up with spoon, fork, and knife toppers for your ballpoint pens. Even cooler? The product uses biodegradable starches and fibers, and it's packaged in recycled wood pulp bags. Personally, I think I'd constantly forget the top was off and accidentally chew on the pen nib...but that's just me.

Now, you're probably thinking, these products are cool, but first place has to be something truly revolutionary. Well, um, think again. First place is *drumroll, please*...a leaf-shaped...spoon. There are no words, people.