GSI Compact Scraper Owner Review by Kathryn Montovan August 24, 2015 Tester Information Name: Kathryn Montovan Biography: I have been backpacking, climbing, kayaking, canoeing and winter camping for over 15 years. My excursions are mostly weekend and occasionally weeklong backpacking and kayaking trips in the wooded and often wet, mountainous terrain of eastern New York and western Vermont. I usually tent camp with my family and love to cook fun and delicious foods on my trips. In general, I strive for a compact and light pack and value well-made and durable gear. E-Mail: sull0294(at)gmail(dot)com Age: 32 Location: Bennington, Vermont USA Gender: F Height: 5' 5" (1.65 m) Weight: 150 lb (68 kg) Product Information Manufacturer: GSI Outdoors Year of Manufacture: 2012 Manufacturer's Website: http://gsioutdoors.com/ MSRP US$ 4.95 Advertised Weight: 0.5 oz (14 g) Measured Weight: 0.63 oz (17.85 g) Dimensions: 3.4 x 2.1 x 0.3 in (8.6 x 5.3 x .8 cm) Material: Nylon 6-6 and TPU Product Description: The GSI compact scraper is a dual use scraper. One edge (orange) is hard plastic and the other is a soft rubber blade. The hard plastic blade is designed to scrape stuck or burnt-on food residue off pots, while the soft rubber blade wipes away stickier, wetter foods. There is a hole which serves no practical purpose that I can see except to attach it to the packaging material.  The packaging does not say that the scraper is heat resistant. Owner Review: Field Information: Over the pack 3 years I have used this scraper on dozens of trips with 1-15 people to clean up foods ranging from thanksgiving in a pot (i.e. mushy quick cook one-pot dinners) to cinnamon rolls (i.e. sticky gooey things that almost always burn onto the pan) and everything in between.   Field Use: When I do dishes on my trips I typically use as little water as possible to get all the food off the dishes and usually drink all the gray water. This reduces the chances of attracting animals by dumping food residue nearby, but makes it unpleasant or unsafe to use a sponge or scrubber to wash the dishes because of the possibility for contamination. Instead, we usually eat all solids off the dishes, then rinse anything left with a little water and drink this water that now contains some small bits of food. But it is very difficult to get dishes clean using only a spoon or fork because of their shape and rigidity.  This scraper was appealing because it looked like it might help a lot with getting all the particulate matter off the pot before adding water. This is nice because gray water is much more pleasant to drink when it has less solid food in it. On my first trip with it, this scraper did a beautiful job removing cooked-on lentils and rice. The soft rubber side easily lifted the gooey mess off the pot, then all I had to do was figure out how to get it off the scraper. On this trip, with just family members, I chose to lick it clean. This is what I would have done if I had been using my spoon, but for some reason my group found it to be less acceptable to clean the scraper by this method. I also used the GSI compact scraper was an outdoor cooking class I led. I wasn't sure that I was going to use it, but threw it in because it was so little that it was worth having in case we wanted it. The first night we cooked chili and cornbread and when the instructors started cleaning the pots, I pulled it out. The other instructors were very impressed. It scraped up the stuck-on, gummed up chili and it was easy to scoop the mess off of the scraper and onto a spoon for someone to eat. Any burnt bits easily scraped off with the hard plastic side. After we got all the particles off the pan, we added a little water and used the soft rubber side to finish cleaning the pan. We poured the gray water into a bowl for someone to drink, and I dropped the scraper into my bowl, rinsed it off with some water, and drank that gray water. We ended the night with the cleanest group dishes that I have seen so far on a trip. The second night, I was not involved in dishes, but one of the other instructors came to find me for the scraper to do the dishes. I do not think I will go on a group trip again without one of these scrapers. Over the past few years I have discovered that the scraper will melt on the edge if used in a hot pan. It also has gotten a few nicks along the edge from tackling burnt-on food, but it is still in fairly good shape and is perfectly usable. I have used it on a variety of pans and have not noticed any damage to these pots and pans. I am generally gentle with my Teflon pots so that I don't scratch them but I have not noticed any problems. And it is easy to hold and use and makes it much easier to clean up after group meals. What I like: 1) Cleans dishes easily and well 2) Light weight and compact 3) Large enough to be easy to hold but small enough to pack easily in my mug Possible improvements: 1) It might be even better if it had a few more holes so it could be used to strain water off of pasta 2) It would be wonderful if it were heat safe Summary: I bought the GSI compact scraper because it was cheap and looked like it might make doing the dishes on camping trips a lot more pleasant. It has surpassed all of my expectations, proving itself to be an extremely useful item. It has quickly become something that I would not want to leave at home, and I highly recommend it to anyone who does dishes in the woods, but particularly to those who drink their gray water.