Best Deal on Ice?

[CambridgeFoodie]

I am hosting a picnic and need to purchase a large amount of ice...was a bit surprised at how expensive ice is these days.

Can anyone please share with me where the best place to buy bagged ice is in the Boston/Cambridge/Watertown area.

Many thanks!

[southie]

I second Acme Ice....They have helped me out with many events!

[Chris VR]

Funny, I noticed the same thing last weekend!

I don't know their pricing, but I'd give a shoutout to Acme Ice http://www.acmedryice.com/

They're nice guys when I go in to get small quanitites of dry ice and pretty conveniently located just north of Inman Square.

[9lives]

I've never shopped around; but Brookline Ice and Coal is a large supplier...http://www.brooklineice.com/index.html

[CambridgeFoodie]

Thank you so much...30 pounds of ice for $6...what an awesome deal!

[MC Slim JB]

I've been using Brookline Ice and Coal for many years. There's nothing like having an extra 60 or 90 pounds of cocktail ice on hand if you're throwing a big party; you do *not* want to run out of ice.

BI&C also sells block ice and ice luges for serving shots (can't say I've ever had one of those at my parties). And if you need to chill something without putting it in a drink, they sell an even cheaper "chilling ice" in brown paper sacks, maybe sweepings from the floor of the icehouse or something, good for chilling kegs and the like. Oh, and dry ice if you want to make your Halloween punch look like witches' brew.

[itaunas]

Any idea offhand what they charge for 10lb (about a good cooler's worth) box of dry ice pellets? When I need some more will do my research calling, but Acme is just under $60 with tax and everything.

[crimsonca]

Brookline Ice charges $12.60 for 10# of dry ice pellets picked up and $36.75 for 50# pellets picked up.

[itaunas]

Thanks. I double-checked and my numbers are above are way off so apologies to Acme. Acme offers 50# for $37 which fills a good sized cooler pretty well.. What confused me is my credit card receipt (I saw it this past week) was for $53 and I can't figure out what else was included, but their price is $37. They don't offer everything that Brookline has, but I have always done well with them. (Just don't believe the sign suggesting you get the key from Savenors after hours, that dates back to the original savenors before the fire and I believe the liquor store which remained for many years, but not today.)

For smaller quantities Acme does have coin-op ice machines and DeMoula's Market basket has the best sized/priced supermarket ice (although its not the best cocktail ice).

[okello]

Dumb question: what is cocktail ice?

[MC Slim JB]

Cocktail ice is Ice cubes, as opposed to ice in block form.