Breast Milk Storage With Less Plastic
Wednesday, May 23, 2012 at 9:11PMI thought I had thought of all the ways that plastics might come across baby #2 since most of us MommyBetas have made serious strides to elliminate plastics from our homes. But since my daughter arrived two weeks ago, I realized that there was one thing I had failed to consider: breast milk storage.
My milk came in the day before I had her and I have had a lot of extra to store. I've been pumping and hoarding it in the freezer but when I went to store it, I realized that the storage bags are plastics that will necessitate heating when it is time to serve - a bit plastic no-no! So I went on the hunt for a better solution.
I found these: Sensible Lines Milk Trays. I bought them on Amazon for a little over $20. Of course I do know that they too are plastic but they don't necessitate any heating. I pour my milk straight into them and freeze. The frozen milk portions are then stored in food storage bags in the freezer. When it comes time to defrost, the cubes go straight into a glass bottle for heating. No heated plastics along the way!
Some of the Amazon reviews say that the trays warp over time. That hasn't happened for me but I have to think they might warp in the dishwasher. I don't put plastics in the dishwasher so that isn't an issue.
So far this has been a pretty good solution but I'm open to 100% plastic-free options too. Any suggestions?
Reader Comments (5)
I don't have an alternative product suggestion, just a comment regarding reheating frozen breast milk. Keep in mind you don't have to go straight from frozen to heated, with a little preparation, you can simply defrost in the fridge, then pour the milk into a glass bottle for heating. That's our plan if we ever have to dive into the abundance of frozen milk in our freezer (so far, 7 months in, we haven't had to touch the 400+ ounces we stock piled in the first couple months).
I committed to no plastic with #3 too but came across the same problem. I ended up using Evenflo glass bottles and a glass mason/weck jars to freeze milk - prob wouldn't work with a huge stash but worked out ok.
I used to freeze and then thaw the frozen milk in the fridge so I never had to heat up the frozen milk that was stored in plastic bags. Worked for us! BrendaG, wow, 400+ oz of milk? That is impressive!!
Try stainless steel ice trays from onyx. I haven't tried them yet but that's what I was planning to use.
The Mumi&Bubi trays would also work. The comment about stainless steel trays intrigued me, but the only ones I can find seem like you can't fill individual cubes, but rather have to fill it all at once (that's a lot of breast milk). That got me thinking of other safer materials and I realized that silicon could be a good option! These might be perfect (and cheap!)! http://www.amazon.com/Tovolo-Perfect-Cube-Trays-Green/dp/B000QIXFBW/ref=reg_hu-rd_add_1_dp