Building record 2873 - Ice house

An Ice house is shown on an OS 1st edition map of Cheshire. The site now occupied by two modern houses. An For a long time, there were few ways of preserving food except salting and pickling. From the 17th century, the idea of an Ice house was introduced to large estates. They were structures built to house blocks of ice to prevent them from melting. They were well insulated and partly underground. The ice was obtained from ponds and lakes frozen in the winter months. Sometimes fields were deliberately flooded by farmers to provide extra income.