Ice cube

From ArticleWorld

Ice cube as the name implies refers to a piece of ice roughly shaped like a cube. It is made by freezing water in trays with cube shaped compartments. They are added to drinks to make them cooler.

In the United States of America, drinks are usually served with ice. When alcohol is served neat with ice cubes only, it is known as “on the rocks”. In Europe drinks may be served with or without ice. Sometimes, crushed ice is used in place of ice cubes. In some Asian counties like India, ice in drinks is regarded as unhealthy. Older traditional people do not use ice cubes at all.

Ice cubes can easily be made at home in ice trays. Water is poured into these trays and kept in the freezer. Modern refrigerators have a built in icemaker that automatically makes ice cubes and stores it in a compartment. It can directly be put into a glass from there. Such cubes are thinner and longer and hence easy to remove from the tray.

When water is frozen very fast, cloudy ice cubes are formed. When water is frozen quickly below its freezing point (as it happens in domestic refrigerators) the dissolved gases and small bubbles have no chance to escape and hence are frozen in place. When water is cooled slowly, these bubbles exit the water and the result is in the form of smooth and clear ice cubes.

Commercially produced ice cubes are absolutely clear because they are frozen in layers, instead of all at once (which is the case in domestic refrigerators). They are usually cylindrical in shape and may have holes through their center.

When ice cubes melt, sometime white flakes are precipitated. This is due to the presence of calcium carbonate in many water supplies. It causes no harm to the human body.