We are all cooking with iron pots now, but iron pots only appeared in the Song Dynasty. How did people cook before the Song Dynasty? According to historical data, we know that people also had other ways to cook food when there was no iron pot. At the earliest time, they used branches to cook food directly, and then pottery and bronze ware appeared to cook food.

It is purely coincidental that early humans learned to use fire. For a long time, people put food on branches and baked it on the fire. This is the earliest way to cook food. This way is of epoch-making significance. Early humans ate cooked food, which increased their life span and greatly promoted the development of intelligence.

In the Neolithic Age, people mastered the technology of making pottery, and pottery became a way of cooking food. The raw material of pottery is very simple, which is clay. The cost of pottery is very low, and most people use it. After getting food, people put it in porcelain, then drain the water and heat it under pottery. During the Shang and Zhou Dynasties, bronzes appeared. At the earliest time, it was also used as a cooker, but bronzes were so precious that only the top dignitaries could afford them. At this time, people have steamed more when making food.

In the above period, people made food in a single way, that is, roasting, steaming and cooking, and the taste of food was more inclined to the original flavor of food. In the Song Dynasty, iron pots appeared, and people cooked food in more diverse ways. Wise people in the Song Dynasty knew that burning coal to make iron greatly increased the output of iron, so iron pots were relatively cheap and affordable for ordinary people. With the iron pot, people have opened a new world of food and made many different kinds of food.