Making my own ice block

[Galaxy_Stranger]

On my current batch, I tried a couple of new ideas I had for wort cooling - and it worked out really well! - TOO WELL!

Anyway, one of the things I did was a few days before I did the batch, I sanitized a gallon zip-lock bag and filled it with water that had been boiled. Then I put that in the freezer and it was ready to go on brew day. But I learned a couple things. One is that I can actually cool the wort down TOO MUCH! It actually got down to about 50° in no time!

The second thing I learned was that if you're going to freeze your water in a zip-lock bag, the corners will fold over, frozen in place. I didn't think much of it because I was able to pull the plastic out when I removed the ice. After I siphoned the wort into the carboy, I noticed a large piece of plastic at the bottom of the pot!

Of course, I had sterilized it so I wasn't worried, but I had obviously missed some plastic!

Anybody have any ideas on how to avoid the fold over, or a better method of making a block of ice like this?

 

[hucklb]

I am planning to freeze milk containers filled with water for my next batch rather than buy ice. If need be, I can cut off the bottom of the container and the ice block should come right out. Alternatively, I can drop the container onto my patio from about shoulder height before cutting open the bottom to break up the ice block.

 

[Galaxy_Stranger]

Yeah, someone mentioned just dumping an entire frozen bottle in and just not worry about adding the volume of the ice - I may try that out. I've got a bunch of 2 liter bottles I could do that with. But it's kinda convenient that it ads volume to the wort.

 

[hucklb]

I think there is a misunderstanding. I put my boil pot in a tub of ice water to help chill the wort. I am going to add the ice blocks to that water not the wort. I may also pump 68 degree water from my pool through the wort chiller to drop the temperature at first sending the returning hot water into the pool (bonus). Once the wort's temperature gets to about 80 - 90 degrees or so and starts to plateau due to the small differential between the temperature of the wort and the pool water, I will switch to pumping ice water through the chiller to get the temp down the last 20 degrees or so. Nothing but the sanitized wort chiller goes into the wort. I'm shooting for a 20 minute chilling time.

 

[Rhumbline]

Lay the bags flat in the freezer, not standing up.

If you are worried about the seal popping, put the in a big tub or something similar.

 

[Galaxy_Stranger]

OH! HAH! Yeah, that's different!

I turned the heat off the wort and had an ice bath ready. In the ice bath, I placed another empty pot. In that pot, I put my ice block. This was a full gallon of water so I counted it toward the final volume. At this point, the wort on the stove was about 180° and I siphoned it into the pot on the ice bath. This was why I sanitized the bag and boiled the water originally for the block of ice. I think removing the wort from the stew pot helps greatly in chilling the wort.

 

[Galaxy_Stranger]

Lay the bags flat in the freezer, not standing up.

If you are worried about the seal popping, put the in a big tub or something similar.

Great idea. I'll try that.

 

[Onkel_Udo]

I use the large 1 quart Gladware container to make block ice for brewing and camping. I have about 36#'s of block ice in my freezer right now.

After they are frozen (about two days) run hat water over the outside and they will slide right out. Put the block in your trash bag with the other 17 in the freezer. Refill the gladware container and put it back in the freezer.

I take 4 coolers to the track every race (about 4 days). The giant food cooler is kept cool the whole time by lining the bottom with these. Beer and NA beverages go in the other three but that only lasts about 48 hours.

4 blocks cool 11 gallons of wort with my IC on a pond pump from boiling to about 90 F.

 

[Galaxy_Stranger]

After they are frozen (about two days) run hat water over the outside and they will slide right out.

Awesome - I'll try that too.

 

[C-Rider]

When I was using ice to chill I kept 3 half gallon bottles n the freezer at all times ready to go. No need to sanitize or boil if it's no going in the wort.

 

[Kharnynb]

I use plastic 2 liter ice cream containers, they are shaped just right for stacking and are smaller at the bottom than the top to make it easier to remove the ice.

 

[Galaxy_Stranger]

That's awesome - I'll have to find a container like that.