bouv, the ice-cubebag is a product of modern civilization. It’s essentially two sheets of plastic (or more probably one folded sheet) fastened together so that they leave ice-cube-sized pockets. You fill it from a hole in the top, and small openings between the pockets lets the fluid fill the entire bag. The product I use is closed by tying two loose ends at the top.
These bags save space in the fridge, obviously never need cleaning, and the “cubes” are somewhat easier to extract than reusable products – just twist each pocket into the glass – but they do result in less appetizing cubes, in fact not cubes at all, but slightly oval, rounded pebbles.
When the bag is empty, it’s thrown away. The product I use is made from bio-degradable polyethylene.
As The Loaded Dog says, it’s commonplace in Vietnam. FWIW, I found their beer quite satisfactory - Beer Hanoi (the cheapest) beeing better than Beer Saigon or 333. It’s also known here in Australia - I’ve drunk Coopers Sparkling Ale (a South Australian bottle-conditioned lager) with ice cubes. It was cloudy but fine.
While I can’t imagine a situation in which I would ever put ice in a glass of beer, I must say that the thread title seems just a bit hyperbolic when placed in the context of its proximity to “Why does earwax remove beer foam?”
It’s a giant taboo on my dad’s side of the family to put ice in any liquid beverage except water, alcoholic beferages which require it, and sometimes kool-aid. We will not do it. If we are thirsty, and there are no cold beverages in the fridge, we will get a warm one and wait until it chills up. At resturants I always order my pop without ice.
This, of course, is the complete 180 of the freaks on my mom’s side. They keep cans and liters of pop in the basement pantry and bring them upstairs for company. They then fill cups with ice and pour in the pop, generally less pop volume-wise than ice. Then they proceed to leave the leftover cans or two liter on the counter!! They can’t even put it in the fridge after taking it out of storage! I can’t believe these people.
I’ve been beaten to it, but I was going to say some of you guys need to get out more. When I was in Thailand in '98 beer always had ice in it, and the locals were quite shocked when we told them that adding ice wasn’t done in Canada. So it seems the same is done in Vietnam, so this would lead me to believe it’s at least a SE Asian thing and no taboo over there… and they probably out number us in N America (no, I’m not interested in anyone’s research on exact numbers), so I wonder which side of the debate is “right”…
[QUOTE]
*Originally posted by Dr_Paprika *
**If I added a lot of ice to my Canadian beer, and it did melt, I’d just tell people it was American.
That comment was completely uncalled for. If you water down Canadian beer, then you have watered down Canadian beer, not American beer. Don’t get me started on Toronto jokes, god help me.
Sitting in a bar here in Tokyo, I observed on a single evening three separate people putting ice in draft beer. This is not warm beer to start with, btw. As my friend (one of the three) observed, he simply prefers his beer much colder than most places serve it.
