It's fast, effective (and fun!) to crush ice or frozen ingredients in a KitchenAid blender, with its stainless steel blades.
Here are our general ice crushing tips!
- Ice can be crushed or shaved at any speed. Blend at a higher speed setting if you're making beverages using large amounts of ice, and for smaller quantities, use a medium setting or 'Pulse'.
- Check if your blender has an 'Ice Crush' feature. If so, you can select it specifically for this purpose.
- No liquid needs to be added for processing ice.
- With foods that tend to stick to the jar, it's helpful to use the 'Pulse' feature.
When using ice or frozen ingredients in a blender, the way the ingredients are layered affects not only the blending process, but also the texture and taste.
Recommended order of ingredient layers when blending frozen ingredients or ice (from bottom to top):
- Liquids
- Sweeteners if any
- Leafy greens
- Soft ingredients
- Fruit and veg, nuts, seeds and grains
- Frozen ingredients and ice cubes.
Some more specific advice for each blender model:
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Blender K400 - Artisan 5KSB4026 has pre-programmed recipe settings like, Ice Crush, Icy Drink and, Smoothie.
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Blender K150 5KSB1325 is known to be the Ultimate Ice-crushing Blender. (Turn the dial to the ice-crush setting or through 3 speeds to see the blender create a powerful vortex in the jar). In fact, it can crush ice in less than 10 seconds (based on half a tray of ice).
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Blender Power - Professional 5KSBC1B0 has a preset recipe programme: Icy Drinks. It also has Variable Times and Pulse for you to customise your blending for any recipe.
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Blender High Performance - Artisan 5KSB6061 has the Pulse function which is ideal for crushing ice (as well as many other uses).
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Blender Power Plus - Artisan 5KSB8270 has the Pulse function which is ideal for crushing ice (as well as many other uses).