I bought a set of these for wedging into bento boxes (it keeps that little something from smooshing into the rice or whatever). They're great for that. If you're making a stir fry and want to dump all your aromatics in a little cup ready and waiting by the stove--great for that, too. Or portioning a snack/side dish for a preschooler in a cute container: perfect.

But as muffin/cupcake liners? Not so good. As you experienced, the only way to remove them is to flip them inside out, and if your cupcake/muffin is quite soft, or you don't do this just right, they get mangled.

we spray ours. we only lightly wash them and let them build up a little grease.
we found out the hard way too!

I spritz mine with nonstick spray and I've never had any problems... I don't think they are advertised as "non stick" so I'm not sure why people seem surprised when their baked goods stick. The cupcakes or muffins pop right out if you spray them. I have several different sets - "regular", a fluted flower shape, and two different heart shapes.

i have these and love them! maybe the ones i bought are just particularly good? i got them at williams-sonoma. when i get the cupcakes/muffins out of the oven, i let them cool a few minutes until cool enough to handle, then i just pick them up one at a time, turn them upside down, and the muffin falls right out into my hand in one perfect piece! i'm not sure why i seem to be the only one who has had such an easy experience.

I must say I've never had good luck with any silicone baking products. I once spilled half my cake batter because the silicone pan was too floppy. Also had trouble getting cakes and cupcakes out of the pan, even when greased. We got a set of various silicone pans for our wedding and ended up tossing the lot.

I use these silicone cups all of the time for all my cupcake and muffin type baking. They are absolutely convenient. What you need to do though is as soon as the cupcakes have cooled to the point that you can frost them- simply hold the cupcake by the bottom, flip it upside down, and gentle wiggle the cupcake free. Unlike a paper cupcake liner- the silicone mold should leave the cupcake edges glossy rather than crumbly. Then line the cupcakes up in some sort of Tupperware after you frost them so that they don't dry out. This is the only disadvantage of the silicone cups is that they don't protect the muffins/cupcakes from drying out quite as much as the paper liners do.

I also never use a cupcake/muffin pan with these. Just arrange them on a baking sheet and go for it. They were meant to be used like this- that is why they are so much stiffer than the paper and do not "peel off" of the cupcake so to speak. Try my method and tell me if it works!

I love mine. I use them for muffins and cupcakes and never had any problems getting them out. They don't just fall out but even my 6 year old has been able to take cupcakes and muffins out of them intact.

PS- don't use the non stick spray. That will just complicate things and leave the silicone forms all greasy. There is absolutely no need for it as the silicone doesn't stick to the muffins/cupcakes if you just flip them over.

tossed mine out. They were ruined after using them once for muffins. Everything stuck and I listened to not use spray because it specifically said not to do it. I never was able to get the baked on stuff off and it just wasn't worth it. i dind' think that wanted to try them again! i had been really excited about them too.

For those who have had good luck, what brand are you using? I've got Wilton brand. I wonder if mine are thicker or stiffer because believe me, muffins/cupcakes DO NOT just slip out when turned upside down! And I've had trouble cleaning them, too. Such a dramatic yes/no here! Is it the brand? Or is there a "silicone thumb?"

I had the same bad experience and found that slathering crisco inside helped, but I felt like that defeated the non-stick purpose. I have used them for making homemade peanut butter cups and chocolatey applications though. Cupcakes, not so much.

@cfauke: You're supposed to put silicone baking pans (like cake pans, for example) on a metal cookie sheet before moving them into the oven.

@cmcinnyc, mine are Regency Silicups. They've been great.

I LOVE mine. Never had a problem. Everything just pops or slides right out. Mine are older, Kaiser brand. I never spray or grease them.
Seems like the ones in the first photo are thicker (and presumably stiffer) than the ones I have. Maybe that matters.

I do think that, because they don't let the sides of the cupcake dry out as much during baking and cooling, silicone might contribute to a more fragile end product. That little bit of crust that comes from a metal pan or paper liner makes them more durable, maybe.

I HATE them. I had the same problem with mine, and I never tried using them a second time. I popped one too many frosted cupcakes up in the air.

I do like cmcinnyc's idea to use them to hold small amounts of foods, though. I'll have to dig mine out and use them in this manner, if I didn't toss them already.

I don't particularly care for silicone liners either. I find the paper ones much more convenient when it comes to muffins/cupcakes.

However, I do use the silicone liners for candy with a great deal of success (homemade peanut butter cups-delicious).

I've found them to be pretty useless, too. I had both regular and heart-shaped ones, and they all were more trouble than they were worth. I wound up giving them away.

Oh I love these! I have ones from Le Creuset and I use them for all my cupcakes (and I make a lot of cupcakes...). I've never had to spray them with anything, but I always take the cupcakes out before frosting them, mostly so I can frost on the sides as well. I think when my boyfriend used them, he didn't take them out before frosting, and I don't feel like they were too messy. The frosting got on our fingers, but we could easily remove the liners. I think the silicone is really thin on them, so maybe that's why they work so well for me? I don't know the answer, but I know that I will use mine forever.

Also, cmcinnyc, my roommate had a Wilton brand assortment of silicone bakeware and it was practically useless. I think all we used out of it were the potholders, but it also came with a cupcake tray and a bread loaf pan, and they were just awful.

Another use for them is to roast garlic. I tried it once after reading to roast it in a muffin tin, but I think it's easier (and saves oven space if you're doing something like roasting garlic for mashed potatoes while making a Christmas roast...).

Don't judge all silicone cupcake liners by this experience alone. I've had mixed results with various types. My kitchenaid muffin tin that has removable silicone liners is hands down the BEST kitchen purchase I have EVER made: nothing sticks, no greasing required, and the easiest thing to clean ever. (And I confess that I let them sit for a couple of days before I clean them, and they still come clean easily.)

What I _have_ found is that the wrinkled silicone products have a harder time releasing baked goods than usual. I've never had that hard a time though. Did you actually combine them with a muffin tin? I've aways used mine separately, placed on a cookie sheet to bake, and it's never been quite that bad. Where'd you get these (so the rest of us can avoid that particular brand)?

Another tip is to push them out from the bottom, like you thought, but push them out onto a cooling rack (um, duh? no offense). I let mine cool in the liners for five minutes, then push them out to cool the rest of the way. If you're looking for a straight-up substitute for paper liners, I don't think silicone is it. But it sure as hell has treated me well when baking. I will NEVER go back to plain muffin tins and paper liners!

I bought one of the lego silicone cake moulds and I was SO excited. I experienced what everyone else has said: sticking, hard to clean, hard to get out. It didn't come out in a lego brick shape at all :( so disappointing. The packaging said not to use any non-stick on it either, cos it was already non-stick....supposedly....

I bought the heart shaped ones to make heart shaped cookies and they worked really well!

I use Silicups brand, which you can find at Williams Sonoma. I bake them on a cookie tray, and have had good results and no trouble with removing cupcakes/muffins from them.

I've had pretty good results with mine, but I wouldn't buy them again; they've got the cute pleating to make them look more like the paper variety, and they're a BITCH to clean. We usually use a toothbrush to get everything out of the cracks.

I do like them, though, because I can do the whole batch of cupcakes on one cookie sheet instead of in three trays of muffin tins. It saves SO much time!

I have several of these liners and have also realized that they don't work terribly well for cake type things. However, I do use them for "Death by Chocolate with Raspberry Spash" ( http://lesleystowe.com/death-by-chocolate-with-raspberry-splash/ ) with great success; instead of making it in a loaf pan as the recipe suggests, I use these silicone liners to make individual servings which are great for dinner parties.

I haven't used the cupcake liners but I used to have a silicone bundt pan. I had been wanting to make lemon bundt cake and I found a wonderful, if a bit fussy, recipe from Cooks Illustrated. I poured it into the pan, baked it for the prescribed time, and ended up with the most disgusting disaster. It was burnt on the edges and raw in the middle. The whole thing - batter, pan - went into the trash can!! Most disappointing.

I bought a silicon muffin pan and absolutely hated it.

I didn't try nonstick spray because the salesperson said not to use nonstick spray on silicon - something about chemicals and such? I don't know. I'll stick to metal from now on.

I don't spray mine and find they turn out fine. I find that once the cupcake is cooled that it pops right out.

If you don't want to use them for baking anymore then they make great jelly moulds if you have kids.

I use mine for every single reason the first poster explained! Awesome for small amounts of ingredients as prep bowls when the kids help (dump into the cup after measuring before the bowl or larger dish, just to be sure!). They've worked for cupcakes, but you do have to wait for them to cool a lot.

Thanks for this article and all the comments, it's interesting to read up on people's opinions. I have a set of regular and small ones that I bought for creating bento boxes but I haven't actually gotten around to doing that yet due to my weird school schedule. I was just thinking yesterday about using them to make cupcakes or muffins as I just recently got into baking, so I'll have to see how that works out.

I received a set of 24 mini-cupcake liners for Christmas. this last week we made a big pot of beef stew. As a Southerner, the only thing that makes beef stew better is...cornbread. So, I used my mini-muffin liners and away they went. I did spray them first with nonstick spray and they worked great!

I am going to try some cupcakes this weekend! I'll let you know!

I hate silicone bakeware. I've tried what seems like every piece on the market and I hate them all! I'll just stick to the old stuff for now.

i also have them and hate them. i received mine, from crate and barrel, as a bridal shower gift. mine also say not to use spray with them, so i didn't. but when i tried making birthday cupcakes for the gift-giver, i ended up with mangled cupcake bits that were hardly presentable. i turned that wreck into truffle-like treats, but didn't have much better success with muffins and have not used them since for fear of wrecking an otherwise perfectly good batch of goodness. they are also incredibly difficult to clean. argh!

I've used my silicone cupcake liners for pretty much everything BUT actual baking. Like other people have said, I've used them to keep food separated in my lunches, and I've used them as condiment cups in my lunches as well. If I did bake with them, I'd prob use a little PAM with Flour in there and hope for the best.

I love mine and have even suggested them to several friends, so I was surprised to see that others have had problems. I always spray them with a bit of olive oil, and I actually have never made cupcakes in them, but I have made muffins and loads and loads of egg muffins. Not only have I had any issues with sticking or crumbling, I also find them very easy to clean. Mine are from Williams Sonoma.

Hmmh. I always serve muffins or cupcakes in paper liners. It looks nicer and keeps your hands clean when taking one from the serving plate.

So, why not bake them in paper liners directly? I don't want silicone liners. Don't want flabby plastic in my kitchen.

I'm curious whether there is a difference in performance based on whether muffin tins are used vs. a baking sheet.

A friend got me a set from target and I've used them with success. I add a little smear of softened butter to the bottoms and don't have an issue with sticking. Cleaning them is a little annoying, and if I want to make 2 batches at once I need backup paper liners. Otherwise, I enjoy having them around.

I'm not sure what brand mine are. Half came from Crate and Barrel, the other half from King Arthur. They're crinkled like the ones pictured. I don't spray mine and I put them in a muffin tin most of the time. Things don't just fall out but they easily pop out, even my 6 year old has been able to get things out of them in one piece including birthday cupcakes along with all of her friends. I don't like using paper liners b/c they aren't reusable like these are.

I have 2 types- one that is much thinner and needs to be in a muffin tin, and ones that I thicker. I vastly prefer the thicker ones! I haven't had problems with them, besides the fact that popovers dont work well in them.

I hate them too, and have had no better luck with or without cooking spray, even though I've read they are supposed to be nonstick. I've used them once to bake red velvet cupcakes too, and not only did they stick like crazy, they also strangely shrank. It was very weird -- I baked half of them in regular paper liners in a metal pan, but I didn't have a big enough pan so I used the silicone ones for the rest, and the ones baked in silicone puffed up and then collapsed, and continued to shrink after coming out of the oven so that they ended up being ugly short narrow cylinders instead of puffed top cupcakes like the other ones.

I have been unhappy with all of the silicone products I've tried. The individual liners (like these) as well as a silicone bundt pan, and a smooth-sided silicone muffin pan.

I find that baked goods do NOT rise as well in silicone as they do in traditional pans (I've tested the same recipe side by side and it's not just a feeling), but sometimes they stick as you've experienced here. And finally, what a pain to clean all those little pleats!

I'll stick with traditional pans, thank you. Easier and more effective all the way around.

I think it depends on the quality of the silicone cups. I have two different sets of those and one of them is excellent with very thin and flexible and easily removed after baking and the other one is just like you described, a pain.

My kids like to line them up across the kitchen in color patterns. That's about all the use they get in the kitchen, though. I have never had success with silicone baking equipment EXCEPT for my Silpats, which I love and would not trade.

So you're using them instead of paper cups? Just line them with the paper cups. Besides, who wants to collect them after a party anyway? They will provide more stability for transport if you put them on a tray and they'll be easier to clean.

Or am I missing something?

I've had issues too and have 2 different kinds of silicone liners- ones like the above pictures (with the deep grooves) and Calphalon branded ones with a soft scalloped "groove" edge. I've found that both work best if you let them cool a bit after baking and then remove the liners- don't wait to frost them and serve at a party. The cupcakes or muffins won't come out in 1 piece and they'll look bad.

I also use them to portion purees for cooking ala Sneaky Chef/Jessica Seinfeld- that way I can make a huge batch of the puree, portion them out into 1/4 cups, flash freeze them in the liners and them pop them out after an hour or so and put them in a ziplock for longer storage.

I also discovered recently an easier cleaning method- I flip them inside out and everything comes of out the grooves much easier.

I'm looking for some silicone liners like the clear or opaque color shown at the top of the post. Can you please share your source? Thanks.

my silicone bundt and bread pans work wonders but my cupcakes get stuck like mad.
They work really well for making portions of agar gelatin with fruit juice.

I find the silicon liners don't work for baking- all the same problems you mentioned. Plus they don't brown at all.

They DO make AWESOME crustless mini quiches, and I used them frequently for that. I also use them (as others do) for bento boxes, where they keep things well situated.

For the people wanting a source- I got mine from Sur La Table. Crate and Barrel has them as well. See if you can hold out for a sale.

I like mine as does my niece who uses hers all the time. The brand is Hamilton Beach and I got them at KitchenCollection.com (and one of their outlet stores.) The Wilton brand has less silicone so it has a lower temperature limit and can leach into the food, changing the flavor. The big reason I wanted them is that I was concerned that cupcake liners have bpa in them, though I haven't found any articles about it or contacted any manufacturers. Does anyone know if this is a valid concern? Thanks.

I just bought and used for the first time the silicone muffin liners: my muffins turned out perfect. So what did I do different, the liners are scalloped, don't have the regular small ridges, they are very flexible-to the point that I use a metal muffin tin with these as liners as you would with paper liners, also I sprayed them with an oil but the second time I used them plain, I waited for about 5 minutes before releasing them-they were too hot to touch when they came out of the oven. I will try them on a cookie sheet next time to see if they hold up.