“Worked at the bar for many years! A simple way to make any drink more...

“Ice is the soul of a cocktail,” say experienced bartenders. Any alcoholic drink with a large piece of clear ice will taste better, and drink it will be aesthetically pleasing. After all, alcohol is not only and not so much an effect as a process, atmosphere and communication.





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Have you ever noticed that the ice served in restaurants is transparent, and the cubes you take out of the molds of your refrigerator are cloudy and white?





How to make transparent ice at home? Don’t believe if you’re told it’s enough to boil or filter the water. Even distilled water will not help.





The fact is that no matter how hard you try to purify water from impurities, there will still be one component in it that is different from H2O. It's air.

By its nature, freezing water tends to form a clear crystalline structure. At the same time, it pushes the trapped air and impurities away from the freezing zone.

In the ice tray, this process occurs from all sides of the cube. The last part that freezes is the center, and it is the center that gets cloudy and filled with air bubbles.

Do we need a completely transparent ice? What is its advantage over ordinary muddy ice made of silicone molds?





First, due to the absence of air bubbles, clear ice melts more slowly than usual, as a result of which your drinks will stay cold longer.

Second, because clear ice melts more slowly, it means your drink will be diluted more slowly with water and retain its rich flavor longer.





A large piece of ice in itself is a cocktail decoration. A huge transparent ice cube squeezed into the “old fashion”, literally squeezing a portion of whiskey or rum, is cool.

How to make crystal clear ice at home You can, of course, buy icebreakerIt is very clean and transparent ice, but it takes a decent place in the bar and costs from 15 thousand rubles.





The best way to get crystal clear ice cubes is through so-called directional freezing.

You'll need it.

• small portable refrigerator for products
• water container that will freely enter the refrigerator
• filter-water
• serpent

Instructions

1. Pour the filtered water into a container and place it in a portable refrigerator.
   
   
   
2. Leave the refrigerator in the freezer for 20-30 hours. The lid must remain open all the time.
   
   
   
3. The water in this case freezes directionally, that is, from top to bottom, because the walls and bottom of the container are isolated, and only from above the water cools strongly enough to freeze.
   
   
   
4. Now the most difficult thing is to follow the process. Every few hours you need to check how deep the water is frozen. It is important not to wait for the water to freeze completely. You only need two-thirds of the water to freeze, but those two-thirds will be transparent and bubble-free.
5. Ideally, you need to set the temperature of the freezer at a sufficiently high - from -1 to -3 degrees, so that the process is as gradual and slow as possible.
6. The result is clean ice.
   
   
   
7. If you completely freeze the water in the container, then all the bubbles will accumulate in the bottom of the ice.
   
   
8. Such ice can also be used, you just need to separate the murky part with a sharp knife. Before you do this, wet the knife in hot water.
   
   
   
9. Place the crystal clear part on the cutting board and cut it into cubes of the desired size.
10. It remains to pour the resulting pieces of ice into a cocktail glass and enjoy the result.
    
    
    

Fun fact: The spheres have the smallest surface area relative to volume, making ice pieces of this rather than cubic shape ideal candidates for cooling beverages.

Ice is one of the tools to create a good mood by making cocktails, and there should be a lot of good mood. Make yourself a cocktail and add a large cube of clear ice. Have a good rest!