So You Want Some Crushed Ice

My husband bought a hand cranked ice crusher (brand Victorio), and while it works decently well, it is a bit slow, the chunks are not that tiny, there is no control over the resulting chunk size. The part that is impossible to excuse, however, is that while the blades are stainless steel, embedded somewhere in the assembly which is not accessible for cleaning OR drying is some ordinary steel which rusts, leaving random pink residue on the resulting ice. Yuck.

After finding out just how much effort he put into finding this device (answer: well under an hour's research online), I decided I could do better. Probably. I bought three devices: a Lewis bag and a wooden mallet, a different ice crusher with a crank and blades and a metal device that works basically like a garlic press.

The Lewis Bag held a lot of ice, but you really shouldn't pack it full. It works better if you have a single layer of ice when you are whacking at it. Also, I think the longer side of the mallet is a bit more effective, altho that could be my imagination. A few whacks gives you small, chunky stuff. Many whacks gives you snow. The Lewis Bag Wins.

The crank handle device produces smallish chunks, definitely not snow. The chunk size is a little larger than the Victorio. Time will tell whether rust develops; so far, none, but it took a little while with the Victorio for it to be a problem. Surprisingly time consuming -- I don't think this is actually as fast as using the Lewis Bag and the mallet.

Last, but definitely not least, is the weird little press thing. In its defense, it is quite small, so you could conceivably travel with this. You could travel with the Lewis bag, but I'd hesitate to pack the mallet. It's sort of large. But this little guy could be packed. And if you fill it with ice, the chunk size is decent, altho definitely not snow. You have a small amount of control over chunk size, depending on how much ice you shove in there at once.

If you have usually crushed ice with a ziplock bag, the Lewis bag, all by itself, should be a meaningful improvement. With the mallet, it is a really big improvement. I've used a metal mallet I have (kitchen mallet -- not sure what they are called) but it is smaller and I worry more about damaging the countertop when I use it. I don't worry at all with the wooden mallet; if I crack a granite countertop with a wooden mallet, I am obviously Wonder Woman or the countertop was crap and needed to be replaced anyway. The Lewis Bag and mallet combo is faster, and gives more control of chunk size.

I'll try to update this as these things inevitably deteriorate and/or break. And if I buy something with power assist, I'll post that, too. So far, I don't see a compelling reason to get into that.

My 2018 New Year's Resolution was to get better at making more drinks consistently.

Created 10 September 2018