Dear readers:  Please forgive my absence. I am undecided about how to continue my blog and instead of posting my doubt, I abandoned ship!  I would like to combine my love with entertaining and all things “home” with my love for organizing, and I don’t know if that means a new blog, or somehow adding that as a category to this one.   I have been working on several projects redecorating and organizing and I just don’t know if this is the right platform to share that.  If you have thoughts, I would love to hear them!

In the meantime, while I figure this out…here are my thoughts on ice cubes. What I have learned in years of travel to France and Spain is that ice cubes are DEFINITELY cultural.  In the US, the more the ice cubes the better.  In France, ice cubes are not very popular.  And in Spain, one or two cubes is ok, but when I ask for EXTRA ice, I get three cubes.

I understand that ice waters down a drink.  In some places, cold drinks are even thought to be unhealthy.  But here in the good ol’ US of A we like ice.  Lots of it. We like to crunch it, munch it and suck on it until our teeth hurt.

When I lived in Madrid there came a time when I had to replace my refrigerator. Being naive, I asked, “Does this model come with an ice maker?”  ”Sí, Señora!  It comes with two!” Naturally, the nice young man thought that by “ice maker” I meant “ice tray”! Ah well.

So with the weather warming up and ice cubes on my mind, I made some with a little twist!  First, these are the standard cubes from the ice maker:

Then, I made ice cubes in a fun shape, perfect in a shot glass with tequila.  And more cubes with lemon wedges, which are great in Perrier.

And finally, I made some big, fat cubes with cucumber slices.  Our local wine bar serves water with cucumber and it’s SO refreshing.

So as summer approaches, make some unique ice cubes.  You could make some with peppers for bloody marys, put cubes with orange slices in iced tea, freeze olives in ice trays for martinis, put limes in ice cubes for lemonade, peach ice cubes in sangria…the possibilities are endless!

Cheers!

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