... With our first child, we invested in an Avent Microwave Steam Steriliser rather than an electronic version – mainly because of its portability and ease of use – and we were quite pleased with it. Babies need the stuff they use sterilised to ensure their immune system doesn’t have to work overtime ... Read review
Choosing Philips Avent means you have the assurance of superior quality products, designed ... more
with you and your baby's needs in mind. Through extensive research and clinical trials, Philips Avent products work effectively together to promote baby's well-b...
Postage & Packaging: £3.95 Availability: Next day delivery by lunch time....
Advantages: Portable, practical, quick and hassle free sterilising Disadvantages: Cycle can take up to six minutes with older microwaves
...child, we invested in an Avent Microwave Steam Steriliser rather than an electronic version – mainly because of its portability and ease of use – and we were quite pleased with it. Babies need the stuff they use sterilised to ensure their immune system doesn’t have to work overtime to fight off any nasty bugs that may be lurking on it. Although a thorough wash in the sink with hot water makes equipment cosmetically clean, you need really high temperatures ... ...our old Avent Steriliser from the attic, but despite a thorough clean before we stored it, it looked a little worse for wear. As such, we decided to buy the new, upgraded model. Enter the Avent Express II Microwave Steam Steriliser.
===WHAT IS IT?===
The product is essentially a large bowl with a clear plastic lid. The lid has two clips – one on either side to fasten it to the bottom half. Inside the bowl is ... more
INTRODUCTION
One of the more tedious chores when you have a new baby is sterilising bottles and other feeding and nursing equipment. With our first child, we invested in an Avent Microwave Steam Steriliser rather than an electronic version – mainly because of its portability and ease of use – and we were quite pleased with it. Babies need the stuff they use sterilised to ensure their immune system doesn’t have to work overtime to fight off any nasty bugs that may be lurking on it. Although a thorough wash in the sink with hot water makes equipment cosmetically clean, you need really high temperatures to kill off the hardier bacteria and viruses. I retrieved our old Avent Steriliser from the attic, but despite a thorough clean before we stored it, it looked a little worse for wear. As such, we decided to buy the new, upgraded model. Enter the Avent Express II Microwave Steam Steriliser.
WHAT IS IT?
The product is essentially a large bowl with a clear plastic lid. The lid has two clips – one on either side to fasten it to the bottom half. Inside the bowl is a blue moulded and shaped rack that has impressions for various products (bottles, lids, feeding cups, lids, breast pump parts etc.). Although the rack is designed specifically for Avent-branded bottles and accessories, we tend to use Tommee Tippee (TT) Closer to Nature bottles to feed our son and these fit in without a problem. Given the TT bottles are the widest on the market at the moment, that bodes well for other makes and brands as well. All of the parts of the unit are dishwasher safe, and as such are easily cleaned and maintained. If it’s not going into a dishwasher, it should be periodically washed and dried between uses. It’s tempting to leave the water at the bottom, but in our experience, this causes a build up of unsightly lime scale in hard water areas. We purchased our unit on sale from our local Mothercare shop for £17.99, but the promotion has since ended. It is currently available on-line from Amazon for £21.99 with free delivery, but prices vary wildly from one retailer to the next, so it pays to shop around before buying. Ours came packaged with a small pair of tongs, an Avent soother, two different sized Avent bottles (125ml and 260ml) with teats, and a small measuring beaker.
HOW DOES IT WORK?
The concept is simple. You pour a measured amount of water into the basin (200ml), place your pre-washed plastic baby equipment into it, attach the cover and nuke it in the microwave for the stipulated amount of time (between two and six minutes depending on the wattage of your oven). It’s good practice to empty out the water and add a new, measured amount for each cycle, as otherwise you may have too little (boiling the unit dry and damaging it) or too much (which means the water doesn’t get hot enough to do the business). The water is vapourised into steam, killing any bugs. You let the unit rest for two minutes after the cycle finishes, pop the top and viola – sterilised baby gear. If you leave the top of the unit in locked position, the contents will stay sterilised for up to 24 hours. Once the top comes off though, you need to bag up the bits as soon as possible, as contamination starts as soon as the air hits them. It goes without saying that the contents can be extremely hot, so you need to remember to leave it to settle before popping open the lid (ensuring it is on a stable surface and facing away from you), else you will get a face full of steam and scalded fingers. Make sure you thoroughly wash your hands before handling sterilised parts, otherwise all of the work will have been for nought. A small pair of white tongs is provided so you don’t have to manually handle them, although to be frank, these are fiddly to use and impossible for certain bottle and pump assemblies.
DOES IT WORK?
I can’t speak for the science part – that bit has to be taken as read – but it certainly works for us on a practical level. We don’t have the space for the footprint an electronic steriliser would take up on our kitchen counter, so this was an obvious solution – for both portability and storage (it practically lives in the microwave). The bowl has a larger capacity than its predecessor and is capable of holding six bottles or two sets of disassembled breast pump parts. A further improvement on the original is the replacement of a click on lid (with tabs that you had to release by pushing them away from the body – these were a real scald risk if you hadn’t let the unit cool sufficiently) with a pair of cool “safety clips” engineered so that you don’t get scalded by escaping hot air. The rack that sits inside the unit has a lot more grooves, indentations and slots than the original and they present the user with a frankly bewildering set of options on how to load the thing. The instruction manual (which has pictorial instructions as well as written notes in several languages) has a detailed set of notes on how to load it properly, but after reading them once, we have loaded it pretty much as we see fit – it does the job anyway. The next time Avent design one of these things, they should try to load it with two hours of sleep and a bawling infant precariously perched on their shoulder. I’d be most interested with the result!
VERDICT
The original unit that served us so well almost five years ago was already a very good product, but with the improvements made to the new model, Philips Avent are on to a real winner. The greater capacity, the safety clips, the portability and ease of cleaning make this a safe and practical solution for sterilising baby products at an excellent price.
Advantages: Easy to use, easy to clean, great value for money great to store Disadvantages: Only holds 4 bottles
...it.
It holds 4 avent bottles and you are able to sterilise 4 of most other bottles you may use instead of avent ones in there by lying them down which is great because we all know how fussy children can be. The cleaning appliances for the bottles and 4 large avent bottles with number 1 teats are supplied with this product which is excellent and it is very good value for money if you can look in the right place for the best deals at the time.
When ... ...is wash the steriliser in the same way swill all the soap suds off and dry it and it is ready to use. All you have to do is add the water in to the base no steriliser liquid needed place in your bottles and put it in the microwave for 5 minutes simple as that it is easy to store away and is a great time saver it takes up less room than the bigger models takes less time to do the job it needs to do and takes less time to clean there is no need to ...
JodieWaite 13.06.2009
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Advantages: Safe, speedy sterilization that?s as easy as 1-2-3. Disadvantages: Steam will burn if cooling time is interrupted.
I was unable to nurse, so I pumped 3-times a day in order to provide breast milk for my son. As a result, I became a full-time pumper and bottle washer! No joke? I was boiling 18 bottles day, until I got my hands on the EXPRESSMicrowaveSteamSterilizer by Avent. I know? many of you are shaking your head, and thinking, ?What a waste of money.? Well, for me this sterilizer was a godsend.
I am NOT a clean freak who sterilizes everything my son touches. I bought the EXPRESSMicrowaveSteamSterilizer to save time, and money. After a brief, and horrible stint with stovetop sterilizing, I began to use the dishwasher to clean my son?s bottles. Oh, and I mean USE. Sometimes I ran the dishwasher 3-times a day JUST to clean bottles. I live in the desert, where water is precious. We pay handsomely for every drop that passes through our pipes ...
Product Information for "Avent Express Microwave Steam Steriliser" »
Product details
Long Name
Express Microwave Steam Steriliser
Type
Steriliser
Manufacturer
Avent
Manufacturer's product description
We particularly liked this sterilising system as it is so easy and convenient to use. It will sterilise up to 4 AVENT bottles or your breast pump and accessories in less than 7 minutes depending on the wattage of your microwave. The system is also dishwasher safe and the clip on lid makes it invaluable for travel. Simply add 200mls of tap water and put into the microwave! The intenseive heat of the steam kills all household bacteria in minutes: 1000-1100W only 4 minutes 800-950W 5 minutes 500-750W still only 7 minutes If unopened, the contents remain sterile for up to 3 hours.
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