Best $2 I ever spent (bar accessories)

Found this Hawaii Ice thing at a thrift store last week.

It was $2, and it was unused - the accessories were still sealed in their factory plastic bags.

I'm always looking for an easier solution to crush ice, and for $2, I am happy!

This thing is called HawaiiIce. It's a plastic contraption that seems designed for making sno-cones or something. I love that it is called HAWAII ice, not Jamaican ice, or Frostee-ice, or igloo-ice or something. Hawaiian Ice. Rockin'.

Comes with two dishes that you fill with water, and freeze. You end up with a hockey puck of ice. You can also use plain old cubes, but it doesn't work as smoothly.

You put the ice puck in the top and the empty cup in the bottom and screw the lid on.

Crank the handle...

..and viola! Shaved ice for those proper mai tais!

Now, this thing shaves the ice a little TOO fine fior many drinks. The line between 'shaved' and 'crushed' can be fine, and sometimes 'crushed' absolutely means 'crushed'. Not 'shaved'.

But, this thing beats the hell out of using cubes, and I noticed that the ice tends to stick together after the drink is poured, so it works pretty well.

I love these things. I've had mine for a couple years and I agree it's great. The only problem is keeping enough of the little ice-puck things made in the freezer...

I got a Hawaii Ice ice shaver at Tuesday Morning for 7 or 8 bucks. It's like that one but more like a drive thru window with the circular part resting on two vertical pieces of blue plastic with molded palm tree designs. Yes, it does shave the ice very fine. The only problem is that I only have three puckmakers and you can rip through them pretty fast. Obviously you could freeze many hockey pucks in advance and store them in the freezer but that's too much forward thinking for me.

I've got a Rival snow cone maker for back up. The ice is a little less fine but it's easier to use since you just drop ice cubes in the top, and since it's electric you have less chance of having one forearm and tricep being twice the size of the other. Note of caution: when using the Hawaii Ice ice shaver, you may want to turn the crank with your "non-drinking arm" (this, obviously, does not apply to two-fisted drinkers). If your drinking arm is suddenly "buff" and of Popeye proportions, you do stand the chance of inadvertantly crushing an eye tooth against your favorite Mai Tai glass. And who wants to have to replace a vintage Mai Tai glass?

I recently bought a couple vintage electric ice crushers-one last weekend with dangergirl. But I haven't tried them yet. Who is your assistant? Or are those YOUR red nails!!! :)

Cool! That reminds me of my old Snoopy Snow Cone machine. I wonder what ever happened to that thing?

I always see Snoopy SnoCone Machines in thrift stores for cheapcheap. That's where I got mine! :)

I've got one of those ice shaver things too. Mine is called a "Tropical Ice Shaver" and it's from Nordic Ware. It looks a lot like the HawaiiIce one and works by the same method.

I'm not too happy with it.

Usually after a number of cranks the metal teeth that dig in to spin the ice puck start to slip. This results in an unusable puck. Maybe there are not enough teeth or maybe the teeth need to be longer. Or perhaps my ice pucks need to be colder.

Does the HawaiiIce one ever slip too?

On 2004-12-08 22:58, Hakalugi wrote:
Does the HawaiiIce one ever slip too?

It can unless you apply some downward force while you turn the crank.

EDIT: If you look at the device that may not seem to make sense since the downward pressure is supplied by a spring. I don't know why but it works better if you push down as you crank. Also crank fast.

[ Edited by: Kono on 2004-12-09 08:23 ]