The Avent steamer and blender is nice, however if you follow the Japanese weaning you won't need it, since we will not blend everything to the very smooth level, japanese style focus on the rough factor of food, babies only eat puree and smooth stuffs during the very few weeks after they start their weaning period. Then the rough level will gradually increase, that is when we will simply use a knife to slice food into tiny pieces, a scissor to cut the veggies and so on. That is why I think there is no need to buy the Avent machine. But if you follow other methods it might be a helpful tool though.
About the freezing trays, I have the full set from
Silicon to plastic. The trays I recommend above is good ones too since they are especially designed for baby food, and it will not so hard to get the cubes out. However I agree the the silicon ones are also very useful. I have the thin plastic trays bought from Japan and these trays are amazing, very easy to get cubes out too ^^
But I do agree with you that we can just use our simple applians from the kitchen if we do not want to add so much extra cost sine raising a baby costs bunch of money already ^^
Thank you for your interesting comment <3