I was surprised to see the reviews here.
* I don't taste 'rubber' from these.
* I do think the other points are fairly valid.
However, I still think these are really cool. Granted, they are not firm (no silicon is) so you have to hold them carefully after filling and put them on a flat surface in the freezer. Granted, silicon is not a slippery surface, so you can't push-slide them anywhere. Granted, they hold the cubes pretty well, so I twist it a couple times then tend to use my finger to push up on the bottom of the cubes I want to come out.
But on the other hand,
* They fit more ice cubes into a smaller space in my freezer.
* They are a better shape IMO.
* Unlike normal trays, they don't dump a dozen ice cubes everywhere when I just want a few out for a drink. I can push out what I want and put the tray back. So I consider this 'a feature not a bug'.
Now, if you have a need to very quickly use many trays of ice, so you need to be able to grab something, twist, get a shower of cubes, and move on, then this is NOT the ice cube tray for you.
But if you often use only some of the tray, and if freezer space is a premium, and if your fingers to push up on the bottom of a cube or pull it out are not crippled, then I think this is a great ice cube tray.
I gave it 4 instead of 5 stars because some of the points people made are valid. It's simply that some of them are not any problem with the product, they are merely a factor of what the product inherently is, e.g., that it is not firm, that it will not 'slide', that all the cubes don't just fall out with a twist -- these are issues of silicon (or the literal cube shape rather than slightly slanted sides), which means it's a 'given' for the product, not a fault, just personal preference about this "kind" of product/feature.
If you want the cube shape, you get the "they don't all fall out at once". If you want the silicon, you get the "doesn't slide" and "isn't rigid". If you don't want those features, well don't buy this ice cube tray, and you'd have no complaints. I actually wanted them, so I think it's a good product.
Tovolo 80-12007 Perfect Cube Silicone Ice-Cube Trays, Set of 2, Dark BlueThis item has nearly as many bad reviews as good reviews, and the simple reason is that half the people were expecting a traditional plastic made stiff and brittle ice tray that would crack in three months.
This ice tray is made of flexible material. The pro is that you can push out one cube at a time without splattering you counter top with a dozen of them. The con is that you can't get all the cubes out at once even if you want. Again, the pro is that it won't crack ever: it can be cut with a knife but can't possibly be cracked. The con is that you have to be careful when filling in the cubes all at a time ere you splash out the water from this flexible tray.
Now that you know what it is, buy it if you think you need it, as I did and am happy with it.
I bought these trays because silicone is one of the least toxic materials for food handling and because each cube is one ounce, which makes measuring my baby's food easy.
I absolutely love them. It's a little work (maybe one minute) to get all the cubes out, but not difficult at all. They freeze quickly - i haven't stacked them on top of one another though.
The only small complaint i have is they are obviously porous, and it takes a good scrubbing to remove the smell of whatever food I last froze in the tray.
However, I think this is the perfect, fairly inexpensive, baby food freezer tray (the other non-BPA etc. versions are way more expensive).
I purchased Tovolo silicone ice cube trays for one reason, I was tired of sticking, cracking, broken ice cubes. Knowing if I bought the same old things, they too would at sometime get old and become useless. So I went looking for something better. Then I found Tovolo silicone trays. These trays are not perfect, but they do work. The square (yes, square) ice cubes come out perfect everytime; so far. They also seem denser, if thats possible. The square shape makes the cube last longer in you beverage. Mostlikely because they melt more evenly than normal cubes. The slight drawback are you have to push out each cube. There is no "twist and empty" action. But the only real drawback is their soft and flimzy. You need two hands to FILL & TRANSPORT them to a flat surface in your freezer. I'll deal with that!!
Larry
Allentown, Pa.
I bought my Tovolo ice cube trays last year to replace some cheap plastic trays which barely lasted six months. I decided to fork out three times as much as the next-most expensive tray sold for believing that I was paying more for quality and function. I was happy with the product at first, but the trays began to develop a distinctive chemical odor. I tried cleaning the trays in several different ways (dish soap, vinegar, and ultimately bleach), but nothing was able to eliminate the smell, which was very unfortunate because the ice cubes picked up the smell and flavor of the silicone. I am now using Rubbermaid trays which, while not as sturdy as the Tovolo trays, create ice cubes that don't make my drinks taste yucky.
I bought 3 of these after seeing them highly praised in Felten's cocktail book "How's Your Drink?". Because my tap water has lots of minerals, I make ice cubes with distilled water & store them in ziplock bags in the freezer; works well.
However I also store the trays in the freezer; after 6 months the trays started to smell BAD, an ugly freezer funk of a musty smell. I found lots of purported remedies on the net, and tried them all. The bad news is, most of them didn't work. But one of them did.
What didn't get the smell out: immersing the tray in white vinegar for 3 days. Other things that didn't work: baking soda (either dry or with water), Simple Green, Joy liquid, Orange Oil cleaner, running 5 cycles in the dishwasher, Oxi-Clean, Clorox. I went a little nuts and also tried immersing 24 hours in Newman's Own Lemonade (did nothing), pineapple juice (helped a little), tomato juice (helped a little more), and orange juice (did nothing). As you can tell, I spent excessive amounts of money and time, stubbornly trying everything I could think of. Foolishly, even.
But one thing did get the smell out completely (and cheaply): dry out the ice tray, put it in a ziplock bag, fill with cheap kitty litter (!), seal bag, and wait 3 days. Poof, odor COMPLETELY eliminated. I bought litter that was on sale at the supermarket: Jonny Cat, $2.50 for a 10 lb bag. Not the fancy stuff at the pet store that costs 4X more. To neutralize 3 trays in 3 separate zip bags used less than half of the 10lbs of litter.
After the kitty litter, I hand-washed the trays thoroughly and then ran them through the dishwasher. Perfect! Odor-free and ready for duty. I learned my lesson: DON'T store the ice cube trays in the freezer. - Tovolo - Kitchen Gadgets - Ice Cube Trays - Silicone'
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