3 Reasons Why You Shouldn’t Leave Your Ice in the Trays
When it comes to beverages, I like extreme temperatures: either icy cold or super hot. This means I need to have a steady supply of ice available at all times to make me happy. Since my freezer’s ice maker is broken, the ice trays are constantly used to make sure that my cocktails, iced tea, or water are properly chilled.
Like most people, I used to just keep the ice in the trays and pop out cubes as needed. In recent years, though, I’ve taken the extra step of transferring the ice into freezer bags and using it from there instead. Why do this seemingly fussy step? Here are 3 good reasons why you shouldn’t store ice in the trays.
1. Evaporation.
While your freezer is airtight, that doesn’t stop water from evaporating. If you leaves ice in the trays for a long period of time, you’ll notice that the cubes get smaller and smaller. And come on now, who wants chintzy ice?
2. Keeping out off flavors.
You know that awful freezer burn flavor? That can happen to ice too. Also, ice will pick up any other strong, probably unpleasant scents that might be floating around in your freezer. A freezer bag keeps all of these flavors out.
3. Convenience.
A freezer bag of ice means you’ll have big, clean-tasting cubes. But let me convince you to take it even one step further! Since I only have two ice trays, I take the time over a day or two to make a few batches of ice to fill up the bag — good insurance in case friends unexpectedly show up for cocktails. Plus, if the cubes happen to be stuck together, I just whack the bag on the counter to loosen them like I would with a bag of purchased ice!
Hopefully I’ve convinced you that it’s worth your time to transfer ice cubes out of the trays when they’re frozen. To me, it’s a small step with a big payoff that’s kept me with a steady supply of ice-cold beverages.