Yes, Lascatx, exactly.. it's kind of crushed, but not really... my wife is addicted to chewing this stuff because it's rather soft, not hard. It's also not truly shaved either.. again, sorry, but rabbit pellets is the closet thing I could thing of, LOL.

The terms used in the industry for that type of ice: pebble ice, Sonic ice, nugget, flaked, cubelet...and, informally, 'rabbit t*rd ice'...no kidding!

All the units I've run across cost several thousand dollars and are aimed at the bar & restaurant business. I don't know of any for the home.

Let us know if you find one; someone in this forum was looking for the same thing recently.

I don't know why someone has't made that ice for home -- it must freeze faster and so many people love it. My boys will get ice in their drinks at Sonic but not other places, and I've been know to stop at a certain gas station for a drink because they have that ice. Good luck, and lettuce know if you find one. LOL

No residental models on the market. The commercial ones that make it are pretty expensive, loud and not very energy efficient. They are also ice machines, meaning there is no freezer portion to keep the ice. The units make ice faster than it can melt.

I don't know why someone has't made that ice for home

I suspect the reason you don't see this stuff in homes is that it is impractical.

Commercial ice machines make ice continously, and dump it into a bin (duh). But unlike home ice machines, the bin is not maintained at freezing temperatures, so the ice continously melts, and drains away, leaving more room for fresh ice at the top of the bin.

If you tried to make this type of ice in a home machine, it would probably freeze into a solid lump, because it is all surface area. All that surface area would absorb a lot of odors, making for not-fresh tasting ice.

PS you can also look for cracked ice, as well as the above mentioned in search engines

LOL Â I had a choice of 2 hospitals to give birth in. They were both great hospitals. I choose the one I did because they had this type of ice to munch on while in labor! That was important to me! :-)

LOL See, I have to think that if the manufacturers read these kind of commnets they would figure out a way to make this kind of ice for home use.

lascatx - the brainpower to make that kind of ice machine for the home is already in the marketplace. It's the demand that's lacking.

I doubt that. Make it work and market it. I know too many people who love that type of ice and you see how much in these comments. A lot of things get done by folks who don't know that they can't be done.

There are "clear ice" residential icemakers that don't keep the ice bin freezing, and let it melt/refresh. I'm not aware of any flakers for the home market though.

Your best bet might be to get a SMALL commercial machine and put it in the basement/garage/etc where you don't have to listen to it.

lascatx - how many friends, and how many machines would you like? While you are right about American ingenuity, the fact at the end of the day is I need ROI as a business executive. While a rabbit ice machine may get me some buzz in the press, boost my ego, and make a few folks really happy, the voulme of sales hardly justifies the human or $$$ investment required to bring it to market. If I simply wanted to do it, it'd be done. A lot of inventors do this, we forget about them unless their product sells. You don't think all appliance people do is just sit in their office and figure how to massage a few dollars more profit out of an oven or DW do you? They solicit customer feedback, desires, talk with designers and industrial stylists, check out the competition, browse foreign marketplaces for things that might fly at home, and daydream about the next new "it" product.

Doesn't matter because you and your like have made the decision for us. My kitchen is already done (nearly) but if there were something, I'd be considering it for my laundry room.

You know, I wasn't planning on a built-in fridge either, but I got one. And even then, I wasn't planning on looking at the Thermador Columns because I figured it would be a waste to get 2 units instead of one. But I opened a French door model because it was sitting there and I was curious, and I wound up withthe columns -- because they were there offering me features I wanted but nobody had thought were important enough to provide before. And I love them.

We are considering an ice maker for our laundry room. We will have a heavier need for the next 6-7 years, but we could just buy ice when we need it.

We love that ice!! In fact DH was asking last week if we could get an icemaker like that for the bar.

There is such an ice machine. It's made by a company called Manitowoc. We are getting one for our new home. It is commercial, but it is small enough to sit on a counter. We're having cabinets built around it. We love "Sonic" ice and are really looking forward to having it available all the time. The price is very reasonable and we will not need a dispenser in our fridge. I'll let you know once we're in and settled how it works. Probably after the first of the year.

Something like this?

Here is a link that might be useful: soft nugget ice machine

I don't know the answer to your question, but the desire to chew ice can be a sign of anemia, so you may want to have a blood count done, if you haven't had one recently.

Connie - that machine is pretty nice if you really want pellet ice but the OP said: "Do any of the residential, under-counter ice makers make this type of ice? "

Manitowoc is pretty much a commercial operation now that they sold the Monogram divising directly to GE, that unit is a commercial unit, it'll require some creative drain strategies if you want to use in on your counter in a residential setting. What kind of cabinetry are you placing beneath it? Are they going to honor their warranty in a resi. setting, not all co.'s do? Also, do you mind sharing the "street" price - it list at 6000 bucks according to one restarunt supply house in ATL, they've a little wiggle room but even at half off it'd be the most expensive residential ice machine by about double.

Please keep us posted, I'd be especially interested in the noise it makes ad how much it operates.

I think the machine everyone is looking for is the C-100 BAE-AD model from a Japanese company called Hoshizaki. This company is the "gold standard" in the industry and just recently began offering a residential model. The only reason I am familiar with it is I ordered one after waiting almost 2 years for the release. The best part is the price- $2300 vs. $6,000 for a commercial unit. It is very sleek, makes a LOT of ice and isn't too large for a kitchen or office. Hope this helps!

Bumping this. . . friends installed a commercial flake ice machine in their pantry several years ago. It is LOUD but makes awesome ice! I saw that Scottsman has made a "chewable ice" machine that was released a couple of months ago but have no idea if this is the same ice. Anyone know?

If so, it is not too late to put the ice machine back in my kitchen!!!!

At the risk of bumping this years-old thread, Scotsman is supposed to be shipping their NU130 under counter nugget ice maker on October 1, 2011 (http://www.icemachinesplus.com/ice-machine-news/ and scroll down to the August entry). Only one or two places (including icemachineplus) have them listed; looks like ~$2400+/- for a unit. Does 130lbs a day, 22lb storage bin. Runs on 120V/15A circuit, looks like average draw is less than 500W full tilt. Takes 9kWh (~$1 in my area) to produce 100lb of nugget ice. The PA-1 version (which is the $2400 model) includes an internal pump for the drain.

I just need to figure out how to sneak this into the playroom kitchenette project without SWMBO finding out what I spent on it.