12 Innovative Ideas for Flavorful Ice Cubes

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If there’s one thing that’s better than ice cubes in your drink, it’s flavored ice cubes in your drink. Floating cubes of orange or lemon or even java are a bit like adding floating Popsicles to your drink without having to mess around with the pesky stick. Flavored ice cubes are refreshing and fun and just the thing you didn’t know your favorite drinks needed.

The problem, of course, is that we’ve been so conditioned to reach for plain frozen water to put in our beverages that it may not occur to us to take things a step further and add flavoring to our ice cubes. The reality is, it usually doesn’t take much more effort to make flavored ice cubes than it would to make plain ones. Often it’s just a matter of filling the ice cube tray with juice instead of water. This is also not to say that these frozen treats can’t be augmented with stuff. Delicate basil or mint leaves, aromatic edible flowers, and twists of citrus peels go a long way to fancying up your flavored cubes.

But even if some flavored ice cube recipes do take more time, it’s worth it in the end when it comes time to taste them. And fortunately for floating Popsicle fans, flavored ice cubes work just as well in your favorite adult beverage as they do in your kids’ sippy cup of apple juice (though to be fair, not all flavored ice cube recipes are interchangeable). Here’s a look at 12 flavors to get you started.

Lemonade tastes like liquid gold on hot summer days. During those periods of scorching heat, the only thing better than a chilled glass of lemonade is a chilled glass of lemonade filled with lemonade ice cubes, keeping the drink from becoming watered down with regular ice cubes. Fortunately, this foodie dream isn’t difficult to achieve. All you need is an ice cube tray, a pitcher of your favorite kind of lemonade, and a few hours to allow the lemonade-flavored ice cubes to freeze. The cubes are even easy to spiffy up. All you need to do is place twisted lemon slices in with the lemonade before you freeze it. Easy peasy, lemon squeezy.

As for what you should do with them, well, you already know that these ice cubes have the potential to amp up your lemonade. However, they can and should be used for so much more than that. For example, if you’re a big fan of the drink, The Arnold Palmer, which combines lemonade with iced tea, having lemonade-flavored ice cubes makes concocting this drink so much easier. And there’s no worry about the lemon flavor not coming through on this one. As the ice melts, the flavor of the lemonade grows stronger and stronger the longer you sip on the drink.

Strawberries and basil love each other in the garden as companion plants, but they’re also the bomb when thrown together in recipes. Think strawberry basil jam, strawberry, basil, and goat cheese salad, and strawberry-basil-infused water and ice cubes. It’s a versatile and refreshing flavor combo that just gels together nicely because the savory basil creates a strong flavor juxtaposition for the sweet tartness of the strawberries. Each individual flavor grows stronger as a result of the influence of the other in the ice cubes.

On the simplest level, these strawberry-basil ice cubes belong in your glass of water. However, when you’re ready to take the flavor up a notch, add the flavored cubes to your lemonade. And when it’s finally time to break out the adult beverages, you can’t beat a mint julep filled with strawberry-basil ice cubes.

When you’re ready to whip up this ice recipe, remember that it’s easier to make the ice cubes if you start with strawberry-basil water. Slice up some strawberries and tear apart some fresh basil leaves and drop them into a pitcher of water. If you want extra flavor, crush up some of the strawberries and basil leaves so that the juices from each seeps into the water. Finally, you’ll get more flavor out of the combo if you allow the water to sit for a few hours before finally pouring it into ice cube trays to freeze.

Although they sound kinda fancy schmancy, mimosas are really quite simple -– just Champagne and orange juice. While many makers of this drink tend to just pour a little sparkling wine into their glass of orange-flavored sunshine, there’s a better way to add flavor and a flare to the beverage: orange juice ice cubes. Just pour the bubbly over the orange juice ice cubes to create a flavorful fountain of foamy orange fun.

They’re easy to make, orange juice ice cubes. You just need a spot of orange juice poured into an ice cube tray to take OJ from morning beverage to a juicy flavor blossom. If you’re after something slightly fancier, twist some orange slices into flower shapes and insert them into the cubes. Or use both regular and blood oranges for these to create more eye-catching orange blooms to fold into your ice cubes.

On their own, these OJ cubes keep your morning juice from getting watered down while still keeping it cold and refreshing. However, the addition of either mint or basil leaves infuses the ice cubes and the juice with herbal freshness, and the basil, in particular, unites the sweet orange flavor with hints of umami spiciness. Lemongrass and OJ pair nicely together as well, introducing even greater hints of citrus freshness to your orange juice ice cubes.

When you drop a few cucumber slices into your water, it amps up the hydrating power of the water. This effect is thanks to not only the generous amount of water that’s found in cucumbers, but also the flavor that cucumbers add to the water. It’s a good option for people who need to drink more water but who don’t claim to be big fans of drinking it. Naturally, cucumber water makes for refreshing ice cubes, too, and they’re just as hydrating as their liquid counterpart.

There are a couple of ways to make cucumber water. The simplest way is to slice cucumbers up and drop them into a pitcher of water for a couple of hours. This allows the cucumbers to infuse the water with flavor before you freeze it into ice cubes. There are any number of varieties of cucumbers you can use for this task, though English cucumbers will probably work best because they have a delicate taste and are easy to slice thinly.

The other way to make cucumber water requires you to blend up cucumbers, lemon, and other ingredients, like mint, together with water. You’ll end up with cucumber slushy, basically. Then you pour this into your ice cube trays and freeze. And bonus tip: Pour the cucumber water into muffin tins instead of regular ice trays to make round blocks of ice that are large enough to hold full slices of cucumber.

It’s reasonable to assume that most people know that any minor owie that has a generous supply of aloe vera applied to it is almost miraculously cured in the nick of time. While this is a bit of an exaggeration, there’s no denying aloe’s power to provide soothing comfort to any injuries or inflammation you have on the skin. What you may not know is that those same healing qualities that aloe vera brings to your skin, it also brings to the insides of your body. This is possible thanks to aloe vera juice, which not only flavors up water just fine but makes for awfully refreshing –- and healing –- ice cubes, too.

If you’ve never had it in juice form before, you can get a hold of some aloe vera juice at places like the Iberia Store online, or if you’re really ambitious, you can make yourself. This might be the most practical route if you’re making ice cubes from it. To get started, you’ll take a clean aloe vera leaf and cut it open. There is latex inside the leaf –- the tell tale yellow film. This needs to be discarded before you can get to the gel. Once you get the gel, put it into a blender, along with some water. You can also squeeze a bit of lemon juice into the mixture if you find the aloe’s flavor too strong. Blend it up and then pour the juice into an ice cube tray to make ice.

Iced coffee has come into its own in recent years, with all kinds of iced coffee drinks hitting the market. Frappes. Iced Americanos. Iced Vietnamese coffees, with their own special brand of sweetness. While all of these coffees taste better if they are undiluted, the last coffee in particular is more flavorful if it’s really strong. In fact, this is the drink’s calling card, so imagine how it would be if its flavor got watered down because the regular-water ice inside it melted too fast. The remedy for this, of course, is to make ice cubes that can’t water down the coffee flavor -– coffee-flavored ice cubes are the name of the game here.

Putting coffee-flavored ice cubes in these and other coffee-based drinks preserves the strength of the java taste while still delivering the cold, refreshing drink experience that people expect from iced coffee. You can make coffee ice cubes from any type of coffee that you like — French roast, morning blend, or an Italian roast. For a more interesting and robust flavor, try a New Orleans’ favorite, the coffee-chicory blend. Or if that doesn’t take the flavor options far enough, try making coffee ice cubes from flavored coffees, like hazelnut, caramel, cinnamon, or mocha.

While coconut water tastes really good with plain water ice cubes, it stands to reason that it would taste better with a few cubes made of coconut water.  In a pinch, you can use plain coconut water ice cubes. You’ll still get the essence of coconut. However, if you blend up some coconut meat with the coconut water, you’ll have next-level coconut flavor to drop into your adult beverage.

Rum-based drinks, like piña coladas, have so long been associated with coconut that they practically beg for coconut flavor. Take a plain rum on the rocks, but instead of plain rocks, coconut water rocks can be used instead. You’ll end up with the chilliest drink this side of the Caribbean. The only thing missing from all of this are the mint leaf — or lemon or lime wedge — garnishes required to make this drink all pretty like and ready for sippin’.

Many flowers aren’t just pretty. They’re edible, too. Think of the many edible flowers that flavor salads and other foods — think basil, zucchini blossoms, rosemary, and thyme. Some flowers, like roses and violets, fill our gardens and sometimes, our plates. Moreover, these edible blossoms aren’t just yummy in a salad. These can flavor up your ice cubes, which, in turn, gives your drinks a sweet or savory flavor, depending on the flower you’re working with.

Edible flowers also look stunning in a glass or floating on the top of a punch bowl. The flowers should be at peak freshness when you put them into ice cubes for the best results. You’ll need to do some prep work to make these bloomin’ cubes. Because bugs will find them just as sweet as you do, you’ll need to inspect them for insects and garden debris before you add them to your ice cube trays. Turning edible flowers into ice cubes requires a bit of flower arranging. That is, you’ll want to place the blossoms in the ice cube tray by hand. You should arrange them so that they look pretty in the mold before you pour water into the compartment. Freeze as usual.

Mint is like refreshment in leaf form. Given how much the cool flavor of mint perks you up, it’s no wonder that so many chewing gum companies boast about their product’s minty freshness. But if you have a tray of mint ice cubes in the freezer, you don’t need any gum. You just need to keep a store of fresh mint handy, so that you always have a batch of mint ice cubes waiting to be used.

How you use mint ice cubes depends on how complicated you want your drink to be. Dropping a few mint ice cubes into your water, along with an optional garnish of some fresh mint leaves, is a refreshing and delicious way to quench your thirst. It’s an especially delish way to perk up sparkling water. Mint ice cubes also offer a yummy way to dress up a glass of lemonade or iced tea. Unsurprisingly, mint ice cubes make your mint julep the flavor garden it deserves to be.

It’s also worth mentioning that mint is a flavor that plays nice with others. This quality allows you to pair mint with cranberry juice or lemonade, which opens up the door for some additional ice cube flavors, and by extension, the number of drink combos you can make. Cranberry mint iced tea, anyone?

The thing that makes creating apple-flavored ice cubes so fun is that there are so many different flavors of apples to choose from, ranging from the unapologetically sour Granny Smith to the sweet-tart sensation, the newly engineered Cosmic Crisp. Slicing any of those bad boys into a pitcher of water releases the sweet juices, infusing the liquid with their flavor. However, unlike apple juice, which can be a tad too sweet at times, apple water, and the subsequent apple ice cubes you’ll make from said water, is usually not too sweet and not very tart. In other words, it’s just right, as Goldilocks would say.

Apple ice cubes taste refreshing on their own or blended with ingredients like mint, fresh ginger, or cucumber. Apple-cinnamon infused ice cubes with a little bit of honey are fun, too. All you need are some apples, a few choice cinnamon sticks, and a spoonful or two of your favorite honey brand. As far as serving apple water goes, try adding apple-infused ice cubes to a glass of water and garnish it with apple slices cut horizontally to reveal the star burst in the apple’s center for an especially pretty and refreshing drink.

When it comes time to add an infusion of cranberry to your ice cubes, a couple of options present themselves – straight cranberries in water, cranberry juice, or a combination of both. However, no matter which cranberry concoction you decide to use to make your ice cubes, you’ll want to start with clean, freshly-rinsed cranberries. You’ll drop those into water, along with some sliced oranges or strawberries if you find cranberries to be too tart when left to their own devices. This becomes the basis for your cranberry ice cubes. Extra cranberry flavor comes from making the ice cubes from cranberry juice instead of water.

These ice cubes are yummy in drinks like vodka and cranberry juice, but also in just plain water. In the latter case, all you need sometimes is just a hint of flavor to make water your preferred alternative to soda. Adding cranberry ice cubes could do the trick. Finally, for a more decorative and yummy flare in your drinks, you can also add a sprig of rosemary or a mint leaf in with the cranberry water before you freeze the ice cubes.

Most people know just how much a tall, sweaty glass of iced tea invigorates you after a hot, stressful day of work and play. It isn’t quite as tart and lip-puckering as lemonade and yet, it’s more than just a tall drink of water. The ice cubes in the drink make it what it is, taking it from brewed tea to chilled thirst quencher quicker than a New York minute. The only thing that could improve your iced tea are ice cubes made from the tea, thus ensuring that none of that revitalizing flavor gets lost thanks to dilution.

From a flavor perspective, there is a great argument for using tea as a basis for ice cubes. Namely, this argument stems from the fact that so many different kinds of tea flavors exist, including black tea, green tea, chamomile, and peachy mint. All of this is to say that you could make tea-flavored ice cubes everyday and not repeat a flavor twice in the same month. So go ahead and make those Earl Grey and lavender tea ice cubes. Or hibiscus and rose petals. Or anything else that strikes your taste buds’ fancy. There’s plenty more flavors where those come from.