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Science of Microwave Ovens (2016)
- bell-cot 2y ago(2016), FWIW. The article doesn't mention issues with putting metal - dishes, silverware, twist ties, whatever - in the microwave. IF you know what you're doing, that's pretty harmless. (If not - sparks, fire, and other excitement often results.)
- lawgimenez 2y agoEspecially don’t forget to remove aluminum foils, sparks inside the microwave is a scary sight to witness.
- newfocogi 2y agoI understand the physics of microwaves but haven't taken the time to understand when metal is dangerous — I tend to just always avoid it. Do you know of any resources that explain what scenarios belong in the "harmless" category?
- cstrahan 2y agoMy (limited) understanding is that the shape is a large factor. Something about sharp edges or points concentrating the electric field induced by the microwaves, leading to a high voltage buildup. So forks are a bad idea, while spoons will likely not result in any sparks.
- slt2021 2y agoI once put food covered with alumnium foil (that had ton of creases) to heat up. That was fun show
- Henchman21 2y agoMy aunt did that with baked potatoes in ~1990 and burned down the entire house.
- EvanAnderson 2y agoOptical disks produce fun, brief light shows in the microwave. Don't run them for more than a couple of seconds, though.
- dole 2y agoAlton Brown used to have a recipe (I'm Just Here for the Food?) for homemade microwave popcorn where you can use a typical metal staple and it won't spark, something to do with the amount of metal, and also actual size of the microwave wavelengths used being bigger than a staple, iirc.
- bell-cot 2y agoGood memory! He also says to use a turntable microwave, to keep the staples several inches apart, and away from the microwave's walls.
- kbouck 2y agoElectroBOOM demonstrates this: https://youtu.be/OyTmJX_TC84?feature=shared https://youtu.be/OyTmJX_TC84?feature=shared
- foobarian 2y agoYeah, Mr. ElectroBOOM has a pretty informative video [1] trying a handful of different configurations of metal objects in a consumer microwave oven. Turns out it's hard to make "interesting" things happen with metal even if you intend to. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OyTmJX_TC84&ab_channel=ElectroBOOM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OyTmJX_TC84&ab_channel=Elect...
- edoceo 2y agoPut a burning candle in there https://www.experts-exchange.com/questions/24081775/Candle-in-a-microwave-Plasma.html https://www.experts-exchange.com/questions/24081775/Candle-i...
- JoeDaDude 2y agoI read somewhere that you can place a candle under a bowl (with allowance for oxygen to get in) and you can capture the plasma given off by the candle. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x5BFIVDUQPE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x5BFIVDUQPE
- jurgenaut23 2y agoI cannot read this title without my brain bringing back memories of 30 Rock
- Cheer2171 2y agoThis last part is such pseudoscience that it makes me suspicious of everything I was nodding along with before: > Of the 70,000 chemicals in widespread commercial production, only around 500 have been competently screened for human toxicity. Since most products are a blend of numerous ingredients, it is axiomatic that all products contain at least one ingredient that is untested and not known to be safe. This includes everything from hand lotion to plastic water bottles to deoderizers.
- whycome 2y ago> at least one ingredient that is untested and not known to be safe This seems kinda okay though. It’s very different to saying “known to be unsafe”. There are tons of untested (or insufficiently tested) things.
- Cheer2171 2y agoDo you not understand what the word axiomatic means? If there are 70,000 chemicals and only 500 have been tested, does that mean *every single product* *must* contain an untested ingredient? No, because products don’t randomly pull ingredients out of a hat. Proof by counterexample: pure water in a bottle made of the many materials that have been tested for food safety. But hey, why bother with facts when you can just make shit up and call it "axiomatic"? Words have meaning.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- KineticLensman 2y ago> My father was a radar officer in WWII, and recalled warming his hands on cold British mornings in front of the beam emitted by a "magnetron" inside his primitive radar transmitter. Then he went back to work detecting Nazi aircraft. But, it is a short distance from warming to cooking- in 1946 engineers at the military contractor Raytheon noticed microwaves could not only warm, they could heat and cook food. In the 1990s I was a contractor at DRA Malvern in the UK, which was one of the successor organisations to the WW2 radar research establishments. The greybeards I encountered always felt that they had invented microwave cooking even if Raytheon got the credit later. Sausages cooked using the lab magnetrons, they said, although unfortunately there were no photographs. The future of cooking was something that famous futurist Arthur C Clarke got wrong. He might have predicted geostationary communications satellites but in his short story The Sentinel - which was the inspiration for the film/book 2001 - the crew of a small lunar rover fry their sausages in a conventional frying pan.
- anotherhue 2y agoYou can put some thermal paper, or a sufficiently large chocolate bar in there (without the turntable) to see the interference patterns yourself without any fancy gear. You can then eat the chocolate.
- nimbius 2y agoprocessed cheese will visualize the waveform well.
- rhodescolossus 2y agoI wonder if there’s a market for a microwave with an IR camera and AI to estimate food weight and thermal conductivity. With accurate heat tracking, it’d only need a button to open the door and no knobs.
- ssl-3 2y agoWe can measure weight using a scale. We can make a solid guess at volume using visible light and a rotating view (already provided by the unfortunately-common carousels), with a bit of CV and math. We can therefore deduce density. We can measure outside temperature using IR. And we can measure the power put into the things being microwaved. And we can also measure the temperature and humidity of the air that is exhausted from the microwave chamber. With all of that data, we can do some cool things. But with only single-button input, there's a lot we can't do: We can't know if the user is cooking a hamburger from raw meat (yes, raw meat can be used in the science oven), or reheating one that was already cooked, or finishing one that was par-cooked. We can't know if they're softening butter to spread onto toast, or melting it to pour over popcorn We can't know lots of things. So we need more than one user input. The slope to getting back to where we started is very short: Some preset buttons that most people will never understand, a speed control that most will never use, and a keypad for a timer.
- SoftTalker 2y agoAgree. I think 90% if people use their microwave to reheat leftovers or cook pre-packaged meals. All they need is a timer. And I'd prefer a dial to a keypad. My wife bought a countertop convection oven that has nearly 100 pre-defined cooking programs and 10 different "quick set" buttons. How do we actually use it? Set a temperature and time. With a dial. Could have be so much simpler.
- ghaff 2y ago>to reheat leftovers or cook pre-packaged meals There was some experimentation early on--I even have a microwave cookbook--but, outside of some vegetables, very few people actually try to cook using one. And, yeah, I don't know the last time I did anything other than set time. I rarely even do anything other than full power. I do use the popcorn setting from time to time but even that is pretty much unnecessary if you listen to the popping. I have to replace my microwave because it caught on fire in the middle of the night and I'll probably get a 4-in-1 Panasonic which will also replace my second oven which I basically never used.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- xp84 2y agoIf even one person here doesn't yet have a fast-reading food thermometer I have to evangelize for them here. Good ones that instantly read used to cost like $75, and the cheap kind would take literal minutes to arrive at the real temp, but I think someone in China figured out the secret and brought the price down to like $14. Mine has a magnet and I keep it right next to the microwave and air fryer. It has made it tremendously easier to get food correctly heated through, in both devices. The other thing I believe in strongly is, for most things, using 40-60% power and heating the food about twice as long as your original instincts say, for more even heating.
- copypasterepeat 2y agoCompletely agree with the reduced power recommendation. That really helps evenly heat foods that start popping in the microwave or have hot spots when taken out. The few extra minutes are usually not a big deal anyway.
- Scubabear68 2y agoIn particular, anything that has a lot of liquid benefits from using lower power for longer. Of course, putting a quart of spaghetti sauce in an open container and microwaving it at 100% will result in some very cool sauce explosions as localized steam in the source rapidly expands and blows giant sauce bubbles all over your microwave.
- Projectiboga 2y agoYes microwaves can go far through ice but only 15 or less milimeters into water depending on the water's temperature. Microwaves are best for ready to eat frozen foods or reheating leftovers spread out over a plate.
- wholinator2 2y agoYeah, the instant thermometers are very nice. Also though, i was recently asked about my favorite nonstandard kitchen appliance and my laser thermometer is my single favorite kitchen gadget, i use it every single time i cook anything. Granted, it reads the surface, but it'll tell you the exact temperature the skillet is at , at every location so you can tell when the cast iron is sufficiently heated to perfect a steak. I prefer my food at about 120°F which is right around the steam point. Also interesting point related to the article, if i point my laser thermometer at the microwave while it's going it'll bug out and return random temperatures between the actual temperature of the window and about 500°F. I'm sure i could figure out why but i just haven't had the time yet
- anotherevan 2y agoOur microwave oven died on Christmas Eve, and I ended up getting one of those newer flatbed ones. The novelty of putting something in there and watching it not rotate has not worn off yet.
- beloch 2y agoIf you're screwing around with microwave sources, I'll pass on a warning I got from one of my profs. Microwaves will heat your body up, but in a relatively harmless way. e.g. If you microwave your hands a bit, blood flow will transfer that heat out and things will remain pretty okay unless you really overdo it. Your eyes are an exception. They're orbs of aqueous humor that's mostly water, but have relatively little blood flow when compared to most other tissues in the body. Microwaves will heat them up, but bloodflow won't distribute the heat away quickly. Protect your eyes around microwave sources.
- chiph 2y agoIf anyone has a school-age child needing a science experiment, my niece created a list of various items and what she expected their behavior to be in a microwave at different cooking times. And then tested her hypothesis in a cheap microwave (out in the yard in case of explosions), documenting what happened with photos and making a conclusion for each. She got top scores from the teacher for following the scientific method.
- craigmcnamara 2y agoPut a whole uncooked egg in the microwave for a few minutes and call me in the morning.