Categories
Good Ice Makes Great Cocktails
Ice can be a pretty boring topic, unless you are talking to a cocktail enthusiast, then you just need to sit back, listen, and enjoy the cocktail they served you demonstrating the potential of ice. Besides filling the glass and chilling the drink, what’s so important about ice? Well, there are a couple of things, including how the ice chills a drink and what it contributes in the way of flavour. Yes, certain ice cubes contribute flavours, and not good ones, usually malevolent ones. Other factors, such as the size of the ice cube, can also affect your drink. Isn’t this splitting hairs? Not really and I shall explain in greater detail why using good ice is a good thing.
The obvious part about ice is that it is simply there to chill the drink. It is true that a really cold cocktail taste better, and that’s because cocktails have a different flavour balance than wine or beer. Your standard megabrew beer has a low alcohol content (5% ABV) so serving it even lightly chilled will remove any traces of the alcohol flavour. When you get into vintage wines, they can have an alcohol range from 12% to 15.5% so the alcohol is more apparent. If the wine is served too warm, then the alcohol will take over and make the wine “hot”. This is not good. But cocktails can have an even higher percentage of alcohol, think martini, so they need to be much, much colder to avoid that “hot” alcohol sensation.
To chill a cocktail you want to use very cold ice. The colder the ice, the more heat it can “pull” from the warm spirits and mixers. To tell if ice is really cold you can simply look at it; if it has a wet look it is starting to melt and is around 0C; if it has a dry frosty appearance it means it is still very cold. The simple rule is that the colder your ice, the colder your drink.
So somewhere in history somebody got the bright idea to put their gin in the freezer to make a super-cold martini. Well that does make the martini cold, but it fails in one area where ice is also important, and that’s dilution. This is another important function of ice. If you think about the wine example and the “hot” alcohol flavours at, let’s say 13% ABV, then having a drink that clocks in at 20% to 40% ABV will completely nuke your taste buds. Cold just won’t make it better. Every good bartenders knows that a little bit of dilution is what makes a drink smooth and appealing. It is always a balancing act, but the general advice is don’t chill your spirits because they need to be warm enough to melt the ice.
Now, fresh ice is best. So I’m going to be straight forward with you so there is no confusion, don’t use ice cubes that have been siting in your freezer for a month, or even a week. Ice cubes will pick up all of the flavours floating around your fridge and pass them on to your cocktail. If you don’t believe me here’s a yummy little experiment you can try.
1. Take an ice cube tray, fill it up and let it sit in your freeze for a month.
2. At the end of the month put as many of the ice cubes into a glass and let them melt.
3. Fill a glass with fresh water from the same source you used to make the ice cubes.
4. Take a sip from both and see if you can tell the difference.
In all likelihood you will probably smell the difference. Do you really want to drink the funky water? If you don’t drink the funky freezer water, why are you putting it into your drinks?
Finally, the size of your ice cube can change the way your drink tastes. Smaller ice cubes tend to melt faster, therefore diluting your drink quicker. A drink will taste it’s best when it is served, the longer you take to drink it, the less flavour it will have when you finish. So here is another bartender trick, use big ice cubes. Bigger cubes will have less surface area then a bunch of smaller cubes. This means that when the bigger cubes melt, they release the water slower and your drink doesn’t get soggy.
Most home ice cube trays are perfect since they make a fairly large cube, but I’ve observed some manufactures changing to smaller cube trays which is not good. Also, a lot of bars are using small ice cubes which isn’t optimal, but many of the truly great cocktail bars have continued using, or switched to, the large ice cube because they know it makes a better drink.
Like great food, great cocktails need to be made by looking at the little details that are commonly overlooked. Ice is a big part of a drink, so using cold, fresh ice is the best way to avoid off flavours and soggy cocktails.
813 Comments on Good Ice Makes Great Cocktails
Leave a Comment
An interesting read!
Your emphasis on large ice cubes seems to be of particular relevance to tall drinks (or at least those served on the rocks). How do you see large ice cubes in relation to shaken drinks where the preference seems to cracked ice? In this situation, I would have thought that the greater the surface area, the colder the drink, and the better dilution. In this case, the skill is then shifted from obtaining quality ingredients to knowing how long to shake the drink for. Just a thought.
My boss doesn't know about it, but I have a wish list. And on the wish list is: Kold-Draft ICE BUTLER which purportedly produces cubes 1"x1"x1" in size!
I've been using those silicon trays that make a true cube of ice, about 1-1/4 inch per side.
Where I fall down is my water source, which is tasting too much of chlorine lately. I should probably switch to bottled water for my cocktail ice.
What timing! I was just thinking that perhaps my ice cubes were too big and I was looking around for ice cube trays which produce smaller cubes (without success). What I guess I should get is a good, old-fashioned ice crusher for those times when smaller cubes and shaved ice is required.
I did see an interesting product and Linens and Things; an enclosed, airtight ice cube tray that you fill up and lay flat. When the whole thing is capped by a screw cap so when the ice is made you give it a couple of slaps, unscrew the cap and shake out what you need. They were a bit pricey at around $3 or $4 (U.S.) each. They appeared to be stackable, too.
We keep a box of baking soda in the freezer which seems to do the trick or eliminating odor and bad taste (at least to me).
Darcy,
You've really sparked my interest to talk about ice again. Have you ever bothered to try to replicate clear ice at home? Any success?
What type of water do you recommend
I tried using spring water but I got some kind of sediment or like white particles?
Kim, for shaking drink smaller ice cubes are fine because the contact time is shorter, but in drinks, big cubes are better. Very few places are going to have two types of ice though. Big ice can always be cracked into smaller ice. So go big.
As for the water source I just have one of those faucet mount Brita filters. The newer models work really well and it makes my coffee taste better too.
Rick, making clear ice is fairly easy, just boil your water first. The only problem comes when the ice forms on top (which is inevitable) and then as the rest of the water freezes it expands and cracks. If you take a toothpick and poke a hole in the ice layer to let the expanding water out, it works better.
Thank you for this post. Ice is one of the most important ingredients in a drink and is the last thing people think of when making drinks.
The quality and size of your ice are paramount to a good drink. When making anything on the rocks, large (and pretty) chunks of ice are just the ticket. For shaker drinks and most of the Tiki/Tropicals you need a good ice crusher because you want to hit the drink with a good bit of ice and therefore need the smaller variety.
And, since you can make ice smaller but not bigger, start with big ice. Nice big cubes and an Ice Crusher are you are just about set!
I'm fascinated by the transitions that spirits go through from being freshly poured to becoming "soggy". My Irish whiskeys and Chartreuse taste great no matter how dilute, but i find that they play on different parts of the palate, and leave different finishes or aftertastes depending on how diluted they become. After realizing that, i've made a habit out of nursing drinks, sipping every few minutes until the last specks of ice are floating on top, just so i can experience the whole spectrum of flavors. Also, I think that some drinks, especially sugary ones like mint juleps, are just better served in a glass full of crushed ice. It looks better, and it tempers the sweetness better than anything else you could add to the drink. Great stuff!
Mike.
I'm fascinated by the transitions that spirits go through from being freshly poured to becoming "soggy". My Irish whiskeys and Chartreuse taste great no matter how dilute, but i find that they play on different parts of the palate, and leave different finishes or aftertastes depending on how diluted they become. After realizing that, i've made a habit out of nursing drinks, sipping every few minutes until the last specks of ice are floating on top, just so i can experience the whole spectrum of flavors. Also, I think that some drinks, especially sugary ones like mint juleps, are just better served in a glass full of crushed ice. It looks better, and it tempers the sweetness better than anything else you could add to the drink. Great stuff!
Mike.
Very good post Darcy - and I see a chance, that you go deeper in this subject!
A you are a scientist, I see a chance that there comes light into the dark.
Big ice cubes are better - fine, that is the knowledge every good bartender knows... But what is about the withdrawal of energy equivalence if ice is melting (and that is the premier reason, why ice is used to chill drinks). And what is about the temperature of ice which is normally just 0 degrees centigrade. Why has normal ice (which is stored in the usual ice containers) 0ºC but a cocktail mixed with this ice has less then 0ºC (I've observed that a stirred cocktail has around -2ºC but a shaken cocktail even -5ºC)?
I hope you can help us to understand this questions - I don't think, that there is any better person than you!
I am looking forward to read some further posts about ice...
Thanks!
DMJ
Thank you for the article and comments. I've found it very useful.
I was wondering whether anyone can tell me where I can find ice cube trays that make really large ice cubes (ie. 40x40x40mm or 50x50x50mm)?
Cheers,
Hendrik
Which companies make machines that produce 1 1/4 x 1 1/4 x 1 /1/4" cubes- other than Kold Draft.
They have raised the price of their units by $1000 to take advantage of their competitive position.