I hadn’t thought much about ice until I began doing research for my book Of Sugar and Snow: A History of Ice Cream Making. I think most of us take ice for granted. My refrigerator pops out more ice cubes than I need in minutes. But back in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, people went to great lengths to get ice. It was harvested from lakes and ponds, stored in ice houses, and bought in 25-pound or larger chunks. The ice kept an ice box cold enough to keep milk and meat fresh for a few days or even a week, depending on the heat and how often you opened the ice box doors.
However, those large chunks of ice had to be cut down to size if you wanted to do something like make ice cream or put some ice in a drink. To avoid flying ice chips, you had to wrap the ice in a coarse coffee sack or an old blanket and attack it with an axe or a mallet. The preferred size for ice cream making was roughly that of a walnut, so this was no small task.
When refrigerators went on the market, they were so different, and so expensive, that manufacturers published booklets – and even hard-cover books – explaining how to make the most of them. A 1927 GE booklet opined that the “total sum of its usefulness has not in any way been discovered.” The publications offered usage tips as well as new recipes that took advantage of the refrigerator, its miniscule freezing compartment, and its ice cube trays.
The recipes included refrigerator cookies, which were mixed, shaped into logs, and refrigerated for a couple of hours, or longer, so they’d be easy to slice neatly before baking. Refrigerator rolls were mixed ahead of time and kept in the refrigerator until it was time to bake them. Frozen salads made their debut. The less said about the salads the better. Mixing canned fruits, cream cheese, and mayonnaise together, freezing the mixture in the “QUICKUBE Tray,” and then turning individual servings onto lettuce leaves and calling them salads was never a good idea.
As for the small, uniform pieces of ice made in the Quickube trays, there were innovative uses for them, too. You’d think that after all those years of chipping ice, simply having plain cubes of ice for a scotch on the rocks would have been enough. But no. Refrigerator manufacturers suggested using ice cubes as “nests for cocktails, grapefruit, melons, or oysters.” Foods like celery, olives, and radishes could be served atop ice cubes, whole or crushed. Ice cubes wrapped in a “fine cloth” could be used to massage the face.
Although clean, clear ice had traditionally been prized, the booklets proposed adding color to the new ice cubes with “pure food coloring.” Or freezing maraschino cherries or lemon slices in them. Or making ice cubes with lemon juice, grape juice, or lemonade.
Why not get a little creative with ice cubes? Thanks to our automatic ice makers, you may have to go out and buy trays to make these. But if you want to give your drinks a little something extra, they are fun.
DECORATED ICE CUBES
Mint leaves, watercress, and candied fruit make very delightful decorating material for ice cubes. Simply put them on the ice cubes and add just enough water to freeze into place. Decorated and garnished cubes should be frozen slowly, by leaving the Cold Control on one of the “warmer” positions. Fast freezing causes rapid expansion which destroys the desired attractiveness. – Your Frigidaire Recipes, 1938.
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