Most of the households in the world today have refrigerators but need to keep food on lower temperatures is not new. People harvested ice and snow as early as 1,000 BC and there are written evidence that ancient Chinese, Jews, Greeks and Romans used to do this. But what people that lived in deserts did? Some of them, like Persians, built an advanced mechanism for this particular purpose.
By 400 BC, Persian engineers had mastered the technique of storing ice in the middle of summer in the desert. The ice was brought in during the winters from nearby mountains in bulk amounts, and stored in their own freezers called Yakhchal, or ice-pit.
These ancient refrigerators were used primarily to store ice for use in the summer, as well as for food storage, in the hot, dry desert climate of Iran. The ice was also used to chill treats for royalty during hot summer days and to make faloodeh, the traditional Persian frozen dessert.
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