But I am not allowed to clean the upper part of the icemachine ( where all the slime happens) because of liabillity. I do my best to keep it clean but not all of it is possible so while its one of the cleanest icemachines I have ever seen its still dirty.
And I work in a very upscale cocktailbar in a very well regulated country.
I can't imagine this to not be the case. Every bartender I know is tweaked out of their mind. Even the ones who see bartending as an art.
I'm not knocking their skill set. But they'll be a rare breed if they think about bartending AND food safety at a high level enough to think about the cleanliness of ice.
What the fuck, only filthy musician's and djs grow those. I recommend those vials with the little spoons found in most reputable headshops (but don't share the spoon)
I used to work at a nice bar. It was just a side gig for "fun". I was always very careful with the ice and ice machine, because i find ice gross in general. I still found it very odd how many people just demand "questionable" ice. I'm glad if i don't get ice, please don't ice adds nothing but grossness to any drink.
All ice machines require monthly if not biweekly cleaning otherwise funky stuff starts growing in the water lines and the ice trays, and other hard to reach areas.
As a former commercial HVAC guy, consider yourself lucky if a place cleans it out once a year.