Ice

So had a little stint of insomnia last night, so was reading Amazon Reviews for this new ice mold I bought.

I had a plastic one that was really cool, but combination of cold and the pressure of freshly frozen ice balls it broke after about a month of STEADY use. (I have a lot of fun with these, so I go into full production mode when I find a cool ice try)

So silicone was what I wanted, silicone just makes better ice cubes, and releases really well.

The positive reviews were why I bought this, but I hadn’t read any of the negative reviews, so I thought I’d look at them.

Some of them are legit. Silicone IS floppy compared to plastic trays so you need to be careful to support it well and not let it spill. Also the lack of rigidity didn’t allow a perfect seal of the mold like with plastic, so you do often have a “rim” of ice where the two sides meet. They come right off…or you can not be such a perfectionist and drop it in your drink.

Some were HILARIOUS, obviously people who couldn’t read directions or understand how ice and water work. Others were people living in fantasy land complaining how their ice balls weren’t PERFECTLY CLEAR. Sorry, that’s not the mold, that’s your freezer…and that’s ALL our freezers, you get clear ice from SLOW freezing. No thanks!

Still a few reviews talked about “Expensive Machines” that they had seen at bars. So I started looking them up. Here’s a video of that!

OUTRAGEOUS! So to make a “longer lasting” ice cube you take some cold ice, and warm it in an aluminum heat synch until its a melting sphere??? And you need to pre-freeze big blocks of ice to feed the beast? My 4-shot tray will make better ice at a fraction of the cost, and when you factor in time, you could simply chip off the imperfections by hand or with chilled tools.

Hey, but that aluminum press only costs a FEW HUNDRED dollars!

I had thought you would get a machine that actually FROZE water for you in a perfect globe, maybe with interchangeable dies! Have fun for a fraction of the price and buy one of these!

**UPDATE** I have taken to adding a bit of water to the top outside portion of the mold to add some weight to the upper half. That appears to make a MUCH better seal making the “Rim” around the middle of the spheres much thinner, and the globes fill the mold cavities much better.

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2 Responses to Ice

  1. D2k says:

    I have a friend that came up with a fairly workable solution to this whole thing, I can’t remember the details so I’ll ask him and get back to you…

  2. Archer says:

    I thought the “home method” for perfectly clear ice cubes was to boil the water, let it cool to room temp, boil it again, let it cool to room temp again, and THEN put it in the ice molds and into the freezer. My understanding is the boil-cool-boil process removes the dissolved oxygen and nitrogen that cause the cubes to not be clear.

    Either way, that’s a huge amount of effort and energy expended for such a trivial thing. Unless you’re into ice sculpture as a hobby/business and NEED perfectly clear ice, that is, but I’ll go out on a limb and assume those folks are a minority.

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