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Did the emperor Nero eat ice? - Printable Version

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Did the emperor Nero eat ice? - Hanna - 07-20-2013

Enyone there can confirm that there wos a kind of ice in the Acent rom.
I find a notit about that Emperor Nero hav
ing slaves to run up the mautain to bring ice down and it wos mixed with fruit and served.

But is there evidens for that? :whistle:

In case do a resepi exsit?


Did the emperor Nero eat ice? - Nathan Ross - 07-20-2013

There are some strange 'facts' drifting around the internet about Nero and his chilled desserts! Some are discussed here:

"Sno Ball" desserts - were they invented by Nero?

To precis my post in that thread, Suetonius mentions Nero's fondness for iced water. Pliny (Natural History 31.40) says that Nero boiled water and then chilled it by packing jars of it in snow to use as a mixer. These two points might have been enough for somebody to invent the story of the fruity ice dessert...

Apicius recommends chilling oysters in snow, and Martial liked to dilute his falernian wine with icy snow-water. Using snow to cool food and drink was fairly common, although expensive due to the cost of transportation and storage. There's no mention in Roman literature, as far as I know, of underground icehouses for storing ice, or more probably packed snow, collected from the mountains, but such things appear to have been known in the ancient world more widely.

The idea (found in other places on the net) that 'ice cream' was invented in 290BC by Q Fabius Maximus Gurges, who mixed snow with "milk, honey, eggs, fruit, and nuts" remains unexplained, meanwhile... ;-)


Did the emperor Nero eat ice? - M. Demetrius - 07-20-2013

This has nothing to do with Nero, but there are several ice caves in the US. One in the Arizona mountains called, "Ice Cave". The Amerindians used it for storing meat and other foods. There is always ice in there. I've seen it with my own eyes. The point is, for such a thing to exist the prevailing temperature must be below freezing. Most often, it seems, these are collapsed volcanic tunnels.

Here's info on that one. http://arizonahiking.blogspot.com/2011/07/ice-cave.html


Did the emperor Nero eat ice? - Hanna - 07-22-2013

Is vine chilled with ice also a fake?


Did the emperor Nero eat ice? - Nathan Ross - 07-22-2013

Wine? Yes - wine was usually drunk diluted with water anyway, and there is evidence (Martial, probably elsewhere too) of chilling it with ice-water. This would be slush, melted ice or perhaps even snow, rather than ice-cubes as we would do today, though.