Ice Tray

If you purchase a refrigerator it will come with an ice tray or a built in ice maker and dispenser, and that will serve you for a long time. Generally an injection molded or vacuum cast solid plastic tray serves fine but has little capacity and the shape of rounded pyramids that allows easy removal from the hard mold is not visually interesting. The mold I received with my fridge made 30 very small ice pieces which requires you to ration and plan far ahead for any ice use. Ice makers fix this issue but the ice shape is still lacking. Ideally large 1"+ ice cubes with perfectly sharp edges would be ideal, but these molds have very small capacity, generally only four cubes.

This tray fulfills many of the requirements and a few new unexpected features. The ice has sharp edges and are densely packed, the shapes are irregular hexagonal and pentagonal prisms which are aesthetically pleasing. The tray is made of a relatively high shore hardness platinum silicone so it is rigid enough to fill holding with one hand, and flexible enough to pop out the ice. The tray acts as a lid for an insulated plastic base with a pop out washable insert, a place to keep the ice while making further batches. A total storage of 132 pieces can be kept and the entire box can be set out for serving. It is also available in red and white colors with the contrasting inset.

Some claim that silicone tray picks up odors over time (12+ months) from the freezer. The suggested fix is to bake the tray at 350°F for 30-90m. I will update if this ends up being required.