Over the years I've gone from drinking purely to be drunk to enjoying the drink itself. I now enjoy the sometimes complex flavours that are in a drink. One thing I have discovered is that bad ingredients make for bad drinks. I'm sure this is not new news, but one thing I'm sure most people don't realizes is that bad water makes bad ice, makes bad drinks. I will not get into the importance of always using the top-shelf ingredients, not all of us can afford it, but using good water to make good ice is something we all can do.
I grew up in a rural village where we all had well water and it was spring fed, but I've live my adult life in cities and not always had good water. The best investment I have ever made in my bar was a water cooler and bottled water. My ice is made from non-chlorinated water that is a pure as you can buy (there is a lot of arguments on how good bottled water is - some say it's just tap water - but in most cases it will be better then city/town water). The water tastes pure, thus the ice tastes pure, the drink is not tainted by the ice and you get to enjoy the flavour of the drink and not impurities in your bad tap water.
Lately I have been having some issues with my ice - fracturing into pieces rather then coming out whole from the tray. I have been doing some research into this and the basic explanation for this is the development of large crystals in the ice. This is caused by freezing too fast, or so the research says. My freezer made great ice before and now it's brittle and breaking, the only thing that has changed is the weather - seems funny to say, but think about this: humidity causes frost in the freezer, frost is ice crystals. Never the less, the solution to the problem is to boil your water before you freeze it. The boiling will drive out extra gases in the water allowing for smaller crystals to form giving better ice.
I hope that this has given some insight to good mixology and helps you make better ice (and therefore better drinks). Try it and I'm sure you will agree that good ice makes a drink that much better.
As always, 'til next time enjoy responsibly.
If you want ice, get a slushy--just a dash of water in my Scotch, thanks.
ReplyDeleteWell, when it comes to Scotch many will say the 'right way' to drink it is with a bit of water - this is very much an old world or classic way to drink it. When it comes to many other drinks a bit of ice is needed. Even a martini requires ice in the mix - it just doesn't go directly into the drink. And in all cases, even your water for you Scotch, good water is required, frozen or not.
ReplyDeleteGood point. I spent an enjoyable (albeit somewhat hazy) evening at an inn in the Scottish Highlands last autumn, as the innkeeper expounded at length on the intricacies of pairing Scotch and water. He was so picky about it that he'd only serve his whiskies with water bottled in the same region as the distillery. He seemed about to slap me when I told him I often just use tap water.
ReplyDeleteThe barkeep obviously understood what it meant to have good water.
ReplyDeleteWe had issues with the ice cracking funny. Best thing to do is put the water in the trays hot and as they cool they turn out excellent. No cracks! and they are all shiny!... such a silly little thing but it works!
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