Want to make your own lolly flavours? Here's our pick of the best ice lolly moulds on the market.
The minute the weather turns warm, we’re all screaming for ice cream. Without an ice cream maker, doing your own at home isn’t easy. But that’s not the case for ice lollies. With the right moulds, anyone can do it. We test the best.
Plain and simple
We all used them when we were younger, and these standard plastic ice lolly moulds from Kitchencraft do the job. They are a substantial size, plenty for kids of all ages (if not a bit too big for tinies).
The handle has a built in drip catcher with straw, to suck out the melted juicy goodness. You can fill them with anything you like and just pop in the freezer until frozen.
Best point: bright, colourful, fun and cheap (from Amazon).
Worst points: not easy to get the lollies out of the moulds once frozen – you have to run under a hot tap, so once you get the lolly out, it’s already melting. And all four are fixed together, so when you defrost one, the others inevitably get a bit defrosted too.
Rating: 6/10
Rocket pops
Giving a bit more va va voom to your standard ice lolly, these Kitchen Craft rocket lolly moulds, also from Kitchen Craft, are fun and a good size, but not particularly special.
Best points: they are individual pops that clip into a base unit, so you can defrost one at a time.
Worst points: they are quite tall, not easy to fit in a freezer compartment upright. They also have very shallow drip guards, and these get in the way of being able to eat the last bit of your rocket pop.
Rating: 5/10
Silicone Calippo moulds
If there was a lolly mould I thought would be good it was the Silkomart Calippo Moulds. But what a disappointment.
Made of silicone, you fill these tubes up, with juice, yoghurt, milkshake etc, and then seal with a silicone stopper before popping in the freezer.
Once frozen, you are supposed to be able to push the lolly up from the bottom like a Calippo.
Except it wouldn’t push up.
Adding extra pressure at the base of the silicone tube just crushed the ice lolly inside. No matter what I tried, I couldn’t get it to work properly.
Best points: easy to fill and seal with no worries about leaking in the freezer.
Worst points: small capacity and impossible to get the ice lolly out afterwards.
Rating: 3/10
Twistix
These Twistix individual lolly moulds (£4.49 from Lakeland) each come with a lid which doubles as a base that you can slot in and twist to push the frozen lolly out of the mould. They are a good size, and worked flawlessly with all kinds of fillings, including smoothie, juice and yoghurt.
Best points: good capacity, really easy to use, mess free, individual moulds, lid means they can be frozen lying down.
Bad points: Only that you get the inevitable crystals in your ice lolly, because the contents still takes a few hours to freeze.
Rating: 9/10
Mastrad ice lolly makers
Another silicone lolly mould, but the Mastrad lolly makers (£9.95 from Amazon) were much more successful. They come with plastic lolly sticks with good size drip guards and also have a neat stand, which holds four lollies individually.
Once they are ready to eat, each mould has a handy tab which you use to pull the silicone away from the now frozen lolly. It works flawlessly and the pops are a funky spiral shape.
Best points: individual pops means you can take just one at a time without defrosting the rest, really easy to get the moulds off.
Worst points: for some, the lollies might be a bit small and the stand still needs to be stored upright in the freezer.
Rating: 8/10
Ice Pop Maker
More than an ice-lolly mould, the Zoku Quick Pop Maker (available from Lakeland) makes ice lollies in 7-9 minutes.
Store it in your freezer for 24 hours before you want to use it. Then take it out of the freezer, insert the stick provided and pour in your juice, smoothie, chocolate pudding or pretty much anything else except any sugar-free drinks/juice because they will get stuck inside the pop maker. Wait between 7-9 minutes, then use the screw on handle to lever the pop out a bit.
Once it’s loose, clip on the drip guard and pull out. Easy.
Best points: The Quick Pop Maker freezes so quickly that you don’t get crystals in your lollies, so they taste better. You can also make great layered pops, with fruits, nuts or chocolate inside, or even pops with juice lolly on the outside and yoghurt or custard on the inside. The possibilities are up to you and you can do it all super-quick.
Worst points: The price is much higher than for normal ice-lolly moulds (although it’s certainly worth the £34.99 price tag), and none of the parts can go in the dishwasher. But then, the manual doesn’t advise you to wash it that often.
Rating: 10/10
This is a classic lovefood article that has been updated