3 Ways To Make Homemade Slushies (Without A Machine)

We’re still in slushie season! Or Slurpee, or ICEE season, or whatever you want to call it. Anyway. There are still roughly six weeks or so before September arrives, and summer starts to gently draw its curtains for another year (can you BELIEVE it’s all going this quickly, because I cannot) – and while a lot of brands spent their slushie capital around July 4, they’re still everywhere. 

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Except, maybe, in your kitchen. While the appeal of a brightly colored, relentlessly sugary convenience store slushie is undeniable, sometimes you don’t want to have to leave your house to get one. Fellow work-from-homers, I see you. So, we thought we’d put together a couple of methods for homemade slushies, which don’t require you to spend hundreds of dollars on a machine. 

Using A Blender

By far the most user-friendly way to whip up a slushie at home – and while you need a blender for it, you’re far more likely to have one than a slushie machine sitting on your counter. Put a couple of cups of ice cubes into your blender, followed by half a cup of sugar and a half-teaspoon of drink mix powder. Then, add around eight ounces of club soda, and blend until it has a slushie consistency. 

If you find that it becomes too watery, top up the mixture with some more ice, and blend again. You can also add more powder if your slushies don’t have a punchy enough flavor. 

The Ziploc Bag Method

This one’s out there, but it works (the University of Maryland Extension – an educational institution! – says it does, after all, and who are we to doubt academia?). Start by filling a quart-sized Ziploc bag with fruit juice. You could also use club soda and powdered drink mix, as above. Then, place the Ziploc bag into a BIGGER Ziploc bag, containing a half-cup of crushed ice and a few tablespoons of salt. Shake the two together until the juice freezes and turns into slush. 

Salt lowers the freezing point of water, thereby making the ice in the bag colder – and in turn, freezing the liquid in your bag. If you want to stretch your slushie out, reserve some crushed ice (unsalted!) and use it to top up your cup. Stir, drink, enjoy.

Freezing And Scraping

If you’ve ever made granita, you’ll know how to make a slushie. Take your slushie base – fruit juice or club soda and powdered drink mix – and place it into a shallow bowl, before putting it in your freezer. Every half an hour or so, scrape it with a fork until the mixture is totally frozen and broken up. It’ll take a couple of hours, but think of it as a therapeutic activity during work breaks.

Then, spoon the mixture into a glass, and top it up with some reserved juice or club soda, stirring it through. Voila: Slushieland. Hot tip: Make double the amount, and reserve some of it to enjoy as a dessert another time. Two for the price of one, people.