Ask MetaFilter questions tagged with icecubes

Large Ice Cubes?

aladfar — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 11:50:04 -0800

My favorite bars use large blocks of ice in their cocktails - much bigger than what can be obtained with a standard freezer tray. How can I make these myself? Is there such a thing as an extra large ice cube tray? I've also considered freezing water in a bread pan and then cutting it down to size somehow, but this would be rather laborious. A tray that allows for significantly larger cubes would be much better. Unfortunately, Google and Amazon searches haven't led me to such a product.

Mmm, garlic-flavored mojito...

arianell — Fri, 18 Apr 2008 16:03:51 -0800

How can I improve the taste of the ice cubes in my freezer? I do a lot of my cooking in bulk, making enough food for several meals and then freezing whatever I don't eat immediately. Right now I have a lot of heavily-seasoned savory foods stored in the freezer, and their scent is permeating my ice cubes and giving the ice a really unpleasant aftertaste. As much as I love french onion soup, I'd rather not taste it in my strawberry lemonade.

All of my frozen foods are pretty well wrapped/insulated , I think - the solid foods are wrapped in aluminum foil and then sealed in plastic freezer bags, and the soups/stews are in small plastic Tupperware-like containers within freezer bags of their own.

So, is there any way to keep the flavors of my frozen food out of my ice completely as the summer months approach?

Why do my ice cubes grow arms?

AlisonM — Thu, 01 Feb 2007 09:12:22 -0800

Why do my ice cubes grow arms? So, whenever I make ice cubes, at least one or two grow what I call an "arm". See the picture here, where its happened to three! Why would this happen? This only seems to happen when I make them (not my roommate), but I think that's because I tend to fill the tray up to the top with water, and she doesn't.

Does it have something to do with the way ths cold air is blowing over the surface of the water? See here - the air comes out of that vent and blows across the top of the ice. Usually, the arms get broken off when I put another tray on top of it (they're not stackable, so the ones that aren't frozen yet can't have anything on top of it).

Science peeps, please help me solve this mystery! Are my ice cubes trying to escape? (ha) Its been bugging me since I moved in to this apartment 1.5 years ago.

Funny Ice Cubes

adamrice — Fri, 23 Jul 2004 14:29:37 -0800

My ice cubes taste funny [more inside] I have a fridge with an automatic ice-maker. It's about 7 years old. Recently, my wife noticed that the ice cubes it makes taste bitter (sort of like aspirin) once they've melted down a bit. Ice cubes made the old-fashioned way in an ice tray don't taste this way, so it's not the ambient freezer environment, I reckon.

Any ideas why this is happening or how to fix it?