How to Fix Bad Tasting Ice

bad tasting ice

After you fill your glass with ice and pour yourself a cold drink, you may notice that it’s tainted with a bad taste. Often, that taste can come from your ice. Having ice come right from the front of your refrigerator into your glass is a wonderful modern-day convenience. But this convenience could become a hassle if the ice coming from the fridge has a bad taste or smell. Luckily, there are a few relatively simple fixes to help solve the problem! Advanced Water Solutions will go over a few causes for the foul taste and odor of your ice and some ways that you can fix the problem.

Check the Water Supply

If your home’s main water supply has a bad taste, it’s a safe bet that your ice will have that bad taste as well. If your ice does taste bad, take a sip of water from your tap and see if the same taste is there. You could also have your water supply tested for minerals, contaminants, or an excess of chemical additives, such as chlorine. If this test comes back showing too much of any of these materials, your home may need to have a whole home water filtration system installed to fix the problem. When you fix the bad taste of your water by filtering out contaminants, you’ll also fix the bad tasting ice.

Check Your Filter

When you taste the tap water and it tastes great, but your ice still tastes a bit funny, it could be that your ice maker filter needs to be cleaned out. Most manufactures suggest that you change your ice maker’s filter every six months to keep your ice tasting fresh. Depending on how often you use your ice maker and the quality of your water, you could need to change that filter more or less often. These filters are typically easy for the homeowner to change on their own, so you should check the user manual to see what it requires.

Clean Out Your Refrigerator and Freezer

Letting mold or mildew go unchecked inside your fridge or freezer could be affecting the taste of your ice, as well as the water that comes from the in-door dispenser. Make sure you thoroughly clean both the fridge and freezer with a mixture of 2 tablespoons baking soda for every quart of hot water. Then rinse and dry. This mixture will both clean and deodorized your fridge and freezer, keeping your water and ice tasting fresh.

Throw Out that Old Food

Along with keeping your fridge and freezer clean of mold and mildew, you also need to keep it clear of leftovers and old food that's gone bad. Any gases that are emitted from the food will transfer into the ice, altering its taste. It may not always be spoiled food that emits these gases. It could also be certain overly fragrant foods making the ice taste funny. Take stock of everything being stored in you fridge or freezer. Make sure to properly dispose of what has gone bad and store the fragrant foods in more sealed containers to keep them from emitting those gases into your ice.

Use a Freezer Deodorizer

If all else fails (or just to be on the safe side), you can get a freezer deodorizer to stick inside your freezer door. This keeps your ice from getting a bad taste or smell from its surroundings and can last up to a full six months. It can also keep perishable foods like fruits and veggies from going bad as quickly. You can use a box of baking soda as well in the back of your fridge, but the fridge/freezer deodorizer is stronger and lasts longer.

Bad tasting ice can be caused by any one of these factors alone or combined. Make sure to run through all of your options, so you can be sure you know exactly what’s causing the ice to taste bad. When you figure it out, most of the time it can be a simple fix and one that will be easy to maintain going forward.

If you’re in the Ventura or Santa Barbara County areas and want to get your water quality checked, call Advanced Water Solutions for a free water evaluation today at 805-263-1542!