if i saw these i’d leave them in the bread section
We need to kill the billionaires and their politicians sooner than immediately right now
What the fuck… My co worker put a video of this… On snap like 11 hours ago from Aldi’s. Like, this could be a screen grab of it.
They’re 4 square cubes of clear ice and Aldi wants like $5 for them.
These work so much better than the unfrozen ice cubes they sold last week.
Why don’t they just put these things into the ocean and solve global warming?
ONCE AND FOR ALL!!
Bad news, everybody!
Why would I buy frozen ice cubes? I have no time to microwave, I’d rather buy fresh ones
I have fresh ice cubes every day, so I literally had a tap of the stuff installed in my kitchen.
You need to try the grass fed free range ice cubes.
I remember when buying bottled water seemed ridiculous.
Until you need like 1000L at once or 10kg of ice.
Go find place in your freezer to cool down 10L of clear ice.
Spoiler: This won’t be only 10L of space you will need.It still does to me
When it’s 2 for $1 or something it’s fine if you’re out. This crap where they filter it pure then add back in the same shit shit took out and charge you $25 is insane.
Wait until the find out about refrigerators
If you are into fancy looking cocktails this product makes sense. Making clear ice cubes at home is not easy.
It emphatically is easy… But a clear ice mold for the less than 5 dollars and make unlimited cubes.
A bartender I worked with made his in a little igloo cooler, of course then you one big block that you have to cut into functionally-sized cubes. But he would also do cool shit like suspend pine needles into it the block so each cube had a little sprig coming out of it after they were frozen and cut.
If you are into making fancy cocktails then you can get into making fancy ice
If you’re into making fancy ice, then you can get into making your own purified water using complete combustion. If you’re into making purified water with complete combustion then can get into making your own hydrogen, carbon, and oxygen. If you’re into making your own hydrogen, carbon, and oxygen then you can get into making your own universe.
I think I did it wrong, I ended up with an apple pie.
Shit, what do I do now? I think I’ve just become God of my own pocket universe.
Edit: I watched The magicians once, but most of what they did didn’t seem to work out.
You can make these arguments about literally any prepackaged product. I’m not defending this ice, but come on. You can make anything yourself, so long as you have the equipment, time, and money. Paying for someone else to have done it for you is about convenience, and is worth whatever someone is willing to pay for it.
Almost done making my ISS, shouldn’t be too many leaks when I’m done with it. I’m using the expensive duct tape after all.
SMH my head, of course you should be making the duct tape yourself 🙂↔️
I have a very well stocked home bar and enjoy making fancy cocktails. My tiny ass freezer barely has room for the 5lb bag of ice I keep in there, let alone space for a fuckin mini cooler to make clear ice in. I also lack prep space to carve ice in my kitchen. You can make fancy drinks without fancy ice. It’ll still taste the sam, it just won’t look as pretty in the glass
One step at a time
Yes… First step buy fancy ice maker that freezes ice in one direction, second step make fancy ice, third step put it in the glass, fourth step pour whiskey on it
these arent occult secrets that take years of study and meditation
There’s even a market for small scale, at home ice makers like this. They’re pricey certainly but not as stupid as paying $5 for ICE.
You just need to keep the water agitated as it freezes to prevent bubbles forming in it, and they sell machines specifically for this that would pay for themselves in no time over buying pre-made fancy ice cubes. They even have ones that make spheres.
No this is bunk.
The answer is directional freezing. Put the mold for the thing you want to be clear in a small cooler (or buy an insulated mold thing), be sure there is a hole in the bottom, fill it with water and put it in your deep freezer. Voilà clear ice for whatever purpose.
You don’t need to agitate it or boil it or use special water, just use physics and you’re all set.
you can also freeze the ice in an insulated container with no lid. that makes air bubbles and impurities collect at the bottom, after which you can cut that part off.
You are the only person in the thread to get this right. Nobody else actually has done it and it shows.
Isn’t this the reason for using hot water to make ice?
That may help slightly, as it lowers the water’s ability to hold dissolved gasses. So boiling it beforehand will force out a lot of the gas that would have become air bubbles. But it’s not perfect, and results vary a lot. There are two main ways to get clear ice:
- Keep it moving while it freezes, so the air bubbles can escape
- Insulate it so it only freezes from one direction.
Basically, the air bubbles cause foggy ice. And air bubbles tend to get trapped because water freezes from the outside (where the cold air is touching it) first. This forms a hard shell, which then traps the gas and causes foggy ice. By agitating the water, you ensure that it doesn’t start freezing until all of the water is ready to freeze. It prevents the shell from forming first, meaning gas can escape the center of the cubes as it freezes.
For the second method, by insulating it, you ensure that the water freezes from one direction. For instance, if you fill an ice chest/cooler with water (effectively insulating it from the sides and bottom) and throw it in the freezer without a lid, the top half of the cooler will be clear ice and the bottom will be foggy. Because as the top freezes, the gas is able to escape down towards the bottom of the cooler. So your ice doesn’t get murky until the gas runs out of room at the bottom of the cooler.
Full of shit.
That does exactly what I said in the second method. It insulates everything except the top, so it freezes in one direction. So I guess thanks for proving my point?
You win that’s right. I read the first part and checked out because it’s Rube Goldberg clear ice. Directional freezing is the way and everything else is stupid noise.
You don’t need a separate production chain made specifically for your homemade drink to look fancy on your auntie’s photo!
Believe it or not some of us like pretty things to enjoy for ourselves, not to put on social media.
And big clear ice melts more consistently in a way that better maintains coldness longer while maintaining a slower pace of dilution. It does make a difference to flavor.
I’d view it as handy thermal mass, useful when shipping other frozen items.
That box is a bit easier to stack than a bag of ice like most other grocery stores have.
And much more expensive.
Isn’t it as simple as just boiling the water and then freezing it?
No. You need to freeze in in an insulated container with only one side exposed so it all freezes in 1 direction. Impurities get pushed to the opposite side and you are left with clear ice.
There are so many dumb as shit comments in this thread about agitating and boiling and purifying water and you’ve got the actual answer, thank you.
This is the answer. Directional freezing creates clear ice.
why is it hard to make?
It’s not hard, it just isn’t particularly efficient or convenient. The standard method is to use a bunch more water that you want to become actual ice, make it in large insulated blocks, then chop at the end. I have a little insulated tray that makes two at a time. They come out pretty clear, but at least half the water used is essentially waste to create a clear cube. The top half being still ice, but full of little bubbles, not clear. If I was throwing a party, as people are want to do on summer weekends, and I wanted many many big clear ice cubes then I’d seriously consider buying a box load.
To get clear ice you have to freeze it slowly, basically just at the freezing mark (32°C/0°F) which is a warmer temperature than most people have their freezer set to. It’s not difficult in an objective sense, it just requires rubbing a couple of brain cells together and a tiny morsel of effort which is apparently more than a lot of people can muster.
alr ty, i was too lazy to search the question and i was not bothered to use AI for this.
I’d drink pisswater ice before I’d pay 5$ for 4 fucking ice cubes.
Ultra pure slow melting… ok… it melts just like regular water
It’s to minimize surface area, making water dilution in cocktails a slower process. An ice sphere would be ideal for this but it’s better than ice from your freezer in that specific task.
Extra micro plastics infused for the smooth slower melt
Though if you’re using a plastic ice cube tray to make ice cubes, there’s a good chance you’re bringing your own microplastics.
Source: got a metal ice cube tray and noticed that weird “old ice” flavour and subtle sheen on the drink surface as it melted is no longer there.
The old ice flavor is bacterial biofilm on the plastic tray, metal is easier to clean
Any nutritional value to that biofilm?
Probably a true claim, because surface area
My store also have Unfrozen Ice Cubes
Americans buy water in plastic jugs??
Sometimes it’s safer that way https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flint_water_crisis
Not always. Sometimes we buy them in little plastic bottles in packs of 24-48!
Some towns still get water to their houses through leaded pipes. This is the most economical way for those people to get water. Others don’t trust their water even if it technically meets EPA standards. And some places just have water that tastes really bad.
Most of America gets water from a tap and maybe filters it.
Others don’t trust their water even if it technically meets EPA standards.
Less “don’t trust the water”, more “don’t trust the EPA”. And under this administration, who can blame them.
It’s a shame that our options are “Lead and PFAS” or “Microplastics and probably PFAS” (not to mention the plastic waste itself and the wild inefficiencies of transporting water by fucking truck of all things)
What, you Europers just drink it from the ground? Where the dirt is? Like savages?
Water? Like from the toilet?
Atleast its not like from the toilet.
It still ain’t got dem electrolytes.
I’m from Austria. My tap water comes from the mountains. ⛰️ 💦
We use bottles… But yes, generally you can just drink your tap water.
Have you never heard of such a concept? Some people do it because they are going camping or in case the water goes out in a storm or rarely if the water from the tap is of dubious quality.
I grew up in a farmhouse that had contaminated well water. We got all of our drinking and cooking water from jugs. It fucking sucked because it was inconvenient as hell
I mean, yeah of course, but preparing camping supplies and going for groceries seems not quite the same thing.
As a European, being longer than maybe a weekend cut off from external help (or the general concept of a natural disaster as a possible occurence) is not really a thing. Worst that happens is some flooding near rivers and the coast on rare occasions.
Dubious water quality is also not a problem people have to deal with on a frequent basis, at least in germany. You can give your landlord major shit if you don’t have access to proper, clean water. (If you own your place it is your problem of course)
Only artisanal wooden buckets for you then?
You must get your water out the toilet
Mine comes from 347 feet below my yard.
I happen to live where the tap water is excellent. It’s from ancient, underground aquifers. The only issue is a little bit high arsenic, which I filter out, but that’s not really necessary, I’ve been told.
It’s not sustainable, eventually the water will run out, but for now, it’s pretty good.
So, no, this American doesn’t buy water in plastic jugs.
Wait, there’s arsenic and the customer has to filter it out? What do the water company do then?
Mine expects me to filter literal shit out. More months than not we get boil orders for “high fecal coloform bacteria”. And the notices come weeks after the testing; so that always makes you feel good.
They probably have a well, this no water company. My water is crazy high in iron and manganese, our softener needs to be replaced and a new filter needs to be installed before we can drink from our well. Pain in the ass but at least all our grey water is cost of pumping electricity only.
Did you miss the part where the mention it was a safe level?
I need to get a bunch of “fresh, never frozen” stickers to put on bagged ice.
“Vegan” stickers on a bag of ice would be silly
Certified gluten free!
I thought these were reusable freeze packs made to look like ice cubes. It’s actual ice…
“Enlarged to show detail”?? Wow
Title of your sex tape
You people are idiots
Is this a freezing kit or actual ice? Because freezing your own ice that looks like that can be difficult.
It appears to be in the freezer so I’d say it’s 100% actual ice.
Ew. I like my ice fresh.
I like my ice millions of years old so I have it flown in from a glacier I’d never touch cheap shit from aldi that’s for the low class folk.
Side note: That would make an excellent exposition for an apocalyptic horror, like a zombie film. Some industry billionaire infects themselves with a parasite or virus that’s been dorment for millions of years…
“This summer, the rich fuck over humanity one last time…”
The longer it’s been frozen, the fewer times it’s been pee.
That’s absolutely why it’s being sold. I bet some high end bars just purchase ice like this in bulk. Not surprising they thought there would be a consumer market for fancy ice as well.
Here’s a video showing how it’s made: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ET8mqVGDQ1s
Sweet, thanks for this, I was curious but had never researched.
Fancy ice is definitely a thing, you can do it at home but not that easily
They do sell machines for at home use but they’re 100s of dollars for a few cubes a day.
You can just boil water and get it pretty clear or boil distilled water and get it really clear.
That doesn’t work. Pouring boiled water into trays still doesn’t get all the dissolved gases out.
Same with distilled water. It’s dissolved air, not solids, that cause the cloudiness.
Boiling the water gets the dissolved gases out though.
Look, if you can pull it off, great.
I’ve tried it, I’ve worked with several cocktail bars and bartenders on this, everyone I talk to who actually has to do it can agree it doesn’t actually work. The companies that produce this ice are using directional freezing, not simple boiling.
And to OP’s point that this is supposed to represent some kind of collapse of society, I’m pretty sure that boiling water before freezing is much more wasteful of energy than just directional freezing.
Lol I saw these at my Aldi too. It’s pretty dumb at first but I have seen ice cubes for sale at liquor stores for making mixed drinks.
Regular tap water usually doesn’t make perfectly clear ice and most trays are a lot smaller than 1.8" cubes. I wonder if the tray is reusable? If you were planning on a cocktail night and knew what you were looking for, this might not be as dumb of a buy as you think, especially if it was a one-time need.
It just looks especially silly at Aldi, a grocery store that prides itself on affordable products and doesn’t sell liquor lol
Tap water can make clear ice. It’s a matter of how it’s chilled.
Yeah, you want it to freeze on one end first to push out the bubbles. And even then it just pushes the bubbles to one end so you’d have to chip/cut away at them if you want perfectly clear ice.
I have molds for that style ice cube and I can’t be arsed to use them, let alone care about the bubbles.
or you can keep water moving and cool from one side only, then remove water from above when you’re done, no need to chip away bubbly ice
I think before babying my ice cube tray for a day I’d just buy 4 for $5 when I want clear ice.
I wonder if the tray is reusable?
The trays to make clear ice usually have a compartment that’s sacrificial (where the non-clear part of the ice goes and is cut off) from what I’ve seen.
Yeah, there’s no better way than directional freezing. Either you freeze big old slabs in a way that pushes the dissolved gases (and many dissolved solids) away from the crystal structure of slowly freezing ice and then cut it after the fact, or you directionally freeze something that has an outlet to push the gases down so that you pull the frozen ice from the top compartment before the bottom compartment freezes.
one big cube won’t melt nearly as fast as several smaller ones, so your ‘beverage’ won’t get watered-down as much.
and yea. it is a silly item for aldi. might just be one of those “we’ll see if it sells or not” things. they often have odd things there that never come back.
