How To Clean The Baby Brezza Formula Pro
The best way we've found to describe what the Baby Brezza Formula Pro does is that it's like a cross between a Keurig machine and a high-end coffee maker. But for baby formula, of course. For this review, I spent 2 months (and counting) using the Formula Pro to make formula for my son Calvin.
Here's a quick video of me walking through setting up and using the Baby Brezza Formula Pro Advanced, and sharing some thoughts on the experience:
Ok, let's dive in further. Since Calvin's adopted and formula-fed, the two months I spent reviewing the Formula Pro Advanced added up to a lot of bottle making and heavy use of the machine. After all of that use, I've distilled down my thoughts into this Baby Brezza Formula Pro Advanced review and included the awesome, the wish it were different, some tips on setup and use, and a verdict. For this review, we'll cover (click a link to jump ahead to that section):
- What is the Baby Brezza Formula Pro Advanced?
- Initial setup
- Using the Formula Pro Advanced
- Maintenance
- Our review of the Baby Brezza Formula Pro Advanced – the awesome, wish it were different, and a verdict.
What is the Baby Brezza Formula Pro Advanced?
In short, the Baby Brezza Formula Pro makes bottles of formula. But that's a simplification. The best way we've found to really capture what it does is a cross between a Keurig machine and a high-end coffee maker. You don't use pods, but rather dump powdered formula (you can use nearly any brand you like) into the top of the Formula Pro Advanced, add water to the Brezza's water tank, and push a button. When you do this, the Formula Pro Advanced will mix the formula with the warm water in the tank (it heats water to approximately 98 degrees and holds it at that temperature until you're ready to make a bottle) to create a perfectly mixed and heated bottle, all in less than 20 seconds.
The Formula Pro Advanced holds 700 grams of formula and 50 ounces of water – enough for 9 six-ounce bottles before you need to replace the water, and about 25 six-ounce bottles before you need to add more formula. The water tank in the Formula Pro Advanced holds water at a constant temperature at all times, meaning it's ready to go at the push of the button and you won't need to wait for the water to heat up, which is how the unit is able to achieve such a fast time to finished bottle.
Initial Setup
The original Formula Pro was a beast of a machine. It had a relatively large footprint and came with 13 removable parts in addition to the main unit. The Formula Pro Advanced is slightly smaller, and really cuts down on the removable parts that need cleaning. In the original Formula Pro, there were 7 removable parts in the formula container, in the Advanced version, this has been reduced to just 3. All of these parts come disassembled (Baby Brezza recommends you sterilize all parts before initial use), which can seem a bit intimidating at first, but in practice, we found it was relatively straightforward and quick to assemble – it took about 30 minutes including the initial washing and drying of parts to sterilize them. The instruction booklet was clear and included pictures as a visual guide.
Another big upgrade with the Formula Pro Advanced is that whereas with the original, you had to manually set the number that corresponds to your formula of choices, with the Advanced, you can set this on the digital display and change it anytime. You still have to figure out the right number for your brand, which involves going to a page on the company's site that's a bit hard to find (here's a direct link to it), and then set the display to the number that corresponds to the formula you're using.
In the end, especially after using the Formula Pro Advanced a few times and discovering just how fast and easy it was compared to other methods of making a bottle, the initial setup was well worth the half-hour time investment.
How to use the Formula Pro Advanced
Since the Formula Pro Advanced stores formula and water and holds the water at the temperature you want, using it is incredibly simple. Assuming you have enough water and formula (there are clearly marked lines on each holding tank that indicate the need to refill), you'll just put a bottle under the spout, select the size bottle you want to make (options are anything from 2 to 10 ounces, in one ounce increments (another upgrade from the original, which only did 2, 4, 6, 8, or 10 oz), hit the start button, and you're off to the races. The Formula Pro Advanced is designed to work with nearly any baby bottle and handled the big Dr. Brown's bottle we used quite easily. It even has an adjustable bottle holder that moves up and down depending on bottle height to prevent splashing.
Pushing start on the Formula Pro causes it to start turning all those wheels you put together in the initial setup process and, by some mysterious means, mix the formula and the warm water together, and then funnel the completed formula into the bottle via the spout. Since you've set your size, the Formula Pro Advanced will automatically stop once it has produced the correct amount of formula. The length of this process depends on the size of bottle you're making, but all are pretty darn fast – 14 seconds for 2oz, 30 seconds for 10oz.
You can actually make a bottle with water that isn't fully heated, which was useful when a couple of times I realized the water tank was empty, and when I had a hungry baby in the middle of the night it was better to have a bottle of cooler water than wait for the water to heat up.
Design
The Formula Pro Advanced moves the water tank from the side, where it was located on the original, to the back, where it's out of the way and creates a slimmer profile and sleeker look and feel. To allow for easy access to the tank for refills and cleaning, the Advanced has a small set of wheels on the bottom that allow for easy rotating.
Cleaning and Maintenance
The Formula Pro Advanced cleaning and maintenance does require a bit of work here and there, which falls into three categories – adding more formula and water as needed, cleaning you should do after several uses, and monthly sterilization.
Adding more formula and water
Every 20-50 or so bottles you make, depending on the current size of bottle you're using, you'll need to add more formula. This process was incredibly simple – just remove the lid and dump in a bag or scoop formula out of a container.
Slightly more frequently – every 6-25 bottles depending on size – you'll need to add more water. The water tank is detachable so you can add water directly by placing it under the tap or your filtered water source, but Baby Brezza makes a huge deal about not getting any water underneath the tank, so I worried about using this process. Instead, I ended up using a big water bottle to pour water into the tank while it was attached to the unit.
More frequent maintenance
According to Baby Brezza, you'll want to clean the funnel piece after every fourth use to remove any formula buildup. This piece is easily removable, so this is quick, and the Advanced has an indicator on the digital display to remind you when it's time to do this.
(Note that the Formula Pro Advanced forces you to "clean" the funnel, but in practice, you can simply pull it out and put it back in again.)
One place I did notice gunky formula buildup more frequently than Baby Brezza suggested was on the bottom of the formula canister where the water mixes with the formula. I ended up cleaning this after every 5 or so uses. The times I forgot and waited longer than that resulted in some very crusty buildup that required some scraping to remove. I used a fork for this and found it weirdly satisfying to do.
Once per month sterilization
Once per month Baby Brezza recommends you fully disassemble the unit and sterilize the water tank, formula tank, and individual funnel and mixing components of the unit. This process took about 20 minutes to disassemble, wash, and reassemble, not including drying time (make sure all of the pieces are completely dry before you reassemble to prevent wet pieces from collecting formula powder.
Baby Brezza recommends cleaning the formula canister and mixing pieces and the funnel by hand using warm water and gentle soap, but the water tank is dishwasher-safe.
My Baby Brezza Formula Pro Advanced review
Overall, the Formula Pro is super easy to use. The convenience of just pressing a button and having a ready-to-go bottle was incredibly awesome, especially when compared to alternative methods of making formula bottles. Again, since Calvin is adopted and breastfeeding isn't an option, we made a lot of bottles at our house. Having used the "hold it under the faucet" and bottle warmer methods with my older son, I know just how painful these can be, especially in the middle of the night. There's not much worse than waiting and waiting for a bottle to be warm when you've got a hungry, crying kid. Beyond the time, the prospect of measuring formula and trying not to spill in the middle of the night and having to turn on bright lights to do so is worth noting too.
The awesome
- Speed. 30 seconds or less from start to finish is darn fast, especially when compared to alternatives.
- Convenience. Again, compared to alternative methods, the Formula Pro is easy and never makes a mess or wastes water.
- Design & aesthetics. The Formula Pro Advanced is a good looking machine and one we didn't mind having on our kitchen counter. But, more importantly, I felt the design was well thought out to make it easy to use, keep it clean, decrease the likelihood of spills, and work well with bottles we already had.
The 'wish it were different'
- Water tank size. At 50oz, the water tank needed refilling after just 9 six-ounce or 6 eight-ounce bottles. This added some time to that '30 seconds or less' number and resulted in a few times when I forgot to fill it up and had to do so in the middle of the night. Obviously, the company was thinking about the size of the unit here, and a bigger tank would have meant more counter space.
- Not a lot of detail on inner-workings. I realize this won't apply to everybody, but I felt like the 'how it works' behind the Formula Pro was a bit lacking. I wanted to understand more about how the thing actually created the bottles, where the mixing happened, etc., but this was lacking from the documentation that came with it, and perhaps caused the issue where I didn't realize I needed to clean the underside of the formula compartment more frequently.
A verdict
I'd struggle to say the Formula Pro Advanced is a 'must have' – you can certainly make bottles of formula without it. But, especially if you're a formula family and are going to be making a lot of bottles over a long time period, it's just awesome and about as close as I've found to a must-have baby product. And, at around $199, it's reasonably priced for what it does and if you're going to be using it for a long time, or perhaps across multiple kids, you can amortize that cost over a ton of bottles made.
The Formula Pro Advanced also ended up saving me an incredible amount of time, which as any parent knows is something that is in short supply and worth a whole lot. For these reasons (and all of the middle-of-the-night heartache the thing saved me, I strongly recommend it. Based on our review, we've added the Formula Pro Advanced to our highly-selective baby must-haves list, which details items we think are at the top of the heap, and can make life with your newborn a whole lot easier.
Formula Pro Advanced FAQs
Cleaning the Formula Pro Advanced
To Clean the Formula Pro Advanced, you remove the funnel every 4 cleanings and gently wash it by hand with warm, soapy water. Less frequently, clean the formula canister and 3 mixing parts by hand, and monthly, clean the water tank, which is dishwasher-safe.
Formula Pro Advanced Powder Settings
The Baby Brezza Formula Pro Advanced uses powder settings to ensure formulas that have different-sized powder grains to mix properly with heated water. Formula Pro Advanced works with around 20 major formula brands in the U.S., you can find a full list here.
Baby Brezza Formula Pro vs Advanced
With the Formula Pro Advanced, Baby Brezza made a number of upgrades vs the original Formula Pro: the number of pieces that needs cleaning is reduced, the unit is smaller, there's now a digital display to choose settings and make bottles, and you can now make bottles in one ounce size increments instead of only even-numbered sizes vs the original.
How long does it take for the Baby Brezza to heat up?
The Baby Brezza Formula Pro Advanced actually stores water heated in order to allow you to heat bottles more quickly. So, the total time to make a bottle is less than 30 seconds (it varies based on bottle size). If your Formula Pro Advanced tank is empty and you need to add cold water, you'll need to allow a few more minutes to allow water to heat up.
Do you need to boil water for Baby Brezza?
Baby Brezza does recommend you use filtered water for the Formula Pro Advanced—in addition to possible health reasons for this, filtered water can prevent buildup in the parts of your Formula Pro. Boiling isn't likely to help with either of these if you're living in a place that has safe drinking water as it's not going to remove the elements that make up 'hard' water or other things your city may have added like fluoride.
Where to buy
The Formula Pro is available at Buy Buy Baby, Babies 'r Us, big box stores like Target & Walmart, and for all you Prime members out there, available through Amazon with free, fast shipping.
The Formula Pro Advanced also comes in Silver and (because what doesn't these days) Rose Gold
Editor's Notes:
- We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated sites. You can learn more about our policies regarding affiliate links here.
- This review was originally published in 2018 as a review of the Formula Pro Original, but was extensively updated to focus on the Advanced and republished in January 2020.
How To Clean The Baby Brezza Formula Pro
Source: https://fathercraft.com/baby-brezza-formula-pro-review/
Posted by: scottofirther73.blogspot.com
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