apartment therapy changing the world, one room at a time

Man, I am starting to feel like a real party pooper with my comments on this site lately, but yeah - I would not have needed or wanted one of these. Or a decorative outlet cover. Or special towels to dry my kid off. Or disposable baby wash cloths or bibs. (Man, do I sound cranky, or what? Sorry! I am all for encouraging the entrepreneurs out there who are apparently convincing many people to buy these things -- more power to ya, and hey, each of these items is probably a "must have" to someone out there. To each his own.)
I'm just saying that I'm amazed by the amount of stuff marketed as baby gadgets that are supposed to make our lives more convenient. I feel like I have saved thousands of $$ just ignoring these things.

My two cents: you will have less clutter in your life, and more money in your wallet at the end of the day if you just use the regular stuff in your house to take care of the regular tasks of caring for small children, from doling out snacks to wiping noses. It doesn't have to be so complicated and require so many "extras."

Um, this is a garlic press.

Just saying.

I guess I can see how this would come into play. Not so different than one of those little food mills that my mom used. Probably easier to clean. I always found a stick blender and big batches more convenient.

But I will say that baby items with terrible puns for names invariably turn out to be awesome. If something can get produced and stay in a competitive markplace despite a terrible name it usually works well.

Hooter Hider - My Breast Friend are two that spring to mind.

Look like an expensive version of a potato ricer.

Um, what Libberator said.

I never had much of a problem throwing a jar of pureed food in my diaper bag if I knew that we were going out to dinner with the baby. And if it was such a surprise dinner that I didn't have time to do that, I probably wouldn't have time to throw the ween machine in the diaper bag either. For the price of this you could have $30 jars of baby food.

I've used my lemon squeezer at home. Works just the same. For going out, a jar of food or share from my own (which he rather have, anyways). Don't think I could carry one of these around.

I'm expecting my first baby, so I'm without practical experience on the topic of baby food. But it does seem cool that this both mashes and contains the food, and the spoon is attached. I could see it being good for travel for $10, not $30.

BTW, a friend of mine owns an upscale baby gear shop. She says that everyone who buys the $150 Babycook food mill/cooker appliance comes back for the $15 hand-crank KidCo food mill. I'm sure y'all are not surprised to hear that.

Baumgak--I'm with you...we don't need so much stuff! When did the urban/eco-conscious/bare minimum philosophy, the one that goes hand in hand with modernist design, get so accessory-laden? I guess every hipster graphic designer with a new baby invents a product...

I agree with TheLittlestChicken. Maybe for $10. I once had to make pureed food in my mother-in-laws kitchen. It was an aggravating experience even though she had all the tools there. Because it was her kitchen and she was trying to be so helpful, we had to do things her way. If I had one of these, I could have saved her effort and mashed up whatever was on my plate. (Granted what she told me she was going to make, was not what she made which caused further confusion. Turned out our dinner was more mashable than what she offered for the baby.) Anyway, this tool might have been nice for that transition between the "jarred food is too runny" and "the food is taking so long to cut up that the baby's getting upset" phase. BTW, some jarred food tastes heinous, and they're heavy to carry. This would give an alternative to that.

none of my four kids has ever had baby food, we're totally anti-baby-clutter, the item is too expensive, buuuut... i think it's a really neat idea! beats some of the other junk that's out there!

how silly! if little food chunks are soft enough to smoosh through the holes, then baby could just pick up the chunks and feed himself. much easier than spoon-feeding a puree, much more fun for baby, less messy and baby tends to eat more that way!

the name is silly too. i guess introducing solids is the beginning of the weaning process, but solids don't replace breastmilk/formula in an infant's diet - they just supplement it - so the name doesn't even make sense. plus the spelling issue.

boo, ween machine! boo! (unless this is some reference to the band ween which i totally don't get.)

Actually....I saw my friend with a better version of this (metal, from France) that she used to travel with. Her toddler joined us for many meals out to restaurants, and she was eating regular food with us, thanks to this metal tool. This version seems cheap and silly (why not just bring baby food jars already pureed) But the metal tool my friend had was useful because it could cut and finely mush meat and other things you wouldn't be able to do with a plastic tool only good for soft foods.

I saw one of these in an overpriced crunchy baby boutique last week. It's definitely a lemon press size rather than a garlic press.

Lemon presses are quite useful for anyone who cook with fresh lemons and limes, and they cost around $10.