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Could My New Dinner Plates Absorb Microwaves?

 
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Long Island Cook



Joined: 09 Jan 2008
Posts: 7
Location: Long Island, NY

PostPosted: Wed Jan 09, 2008 4:23 pm    Post subject: Could My New Dinner Plates Absorb Microwaves? Reply with quote

My wife and I recently purchased a new set of dinner plates at Macy's. Square appears to be the new plate of choice and these are square plates, a bit oversized and and have a green finish that appears to have been painted on and glazed. You see this type of plate in many shops.
I have noticed when I put these new plates in our microwave oven to reheat something, the plate gets hotter than the item to be reheated. Could the plates be absorbing the microwave also.? They say they are microwave safe.! Dragged out a bunch of old correlle plates for use in the microwave, afraid since these new plates become hot.
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gfairbairn



Joined: 07 Jan 2008
Posts: 31
Location: http://athenafoods.com/

PostPosted: Wed Jan 09, 2008 9:28 pm    Post subject: Re: Could My New Dinner Plates Absorb Microwaves? Reply with quote

Long Island Cook wrote:
My wife and I recently purchased a new set of dinner plates at Macy's. Square appears to be the new plate of choice and these are square plates, a bit oversized and and have a green finish that appears to have been painted on and glazed. You see this type of plate in many shops.
I have noticed when I put these new plates in our microwave oven to reheat something, the plate gets hotter than the item to be reheated. Could the plates be absorbing the microwave also.? They say they are microwave safe.! Dragged out a bunch of old correlle plates for use in the microwave, afraid since these new plates become hot.


Hmmm...that is odd if they say they are microwave safe...they definitely should not get hotter than the food you are heating up.
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Long Island Cook



Joined: 09 Jan 2008
Posts: 7
Location: Long Island, NY

PostPosted: Tue Jan 15, 2008 5:23 pm    Post subject: Answer my own question Reply with quote

Got to thinking, this is Cooking for Engineers.
Why don't I use some of my engineering background to conduct an experiment to answer my own question

So here it goes.
To test if an item is microwave safe it is recommended in the microwave oven manual (reading the manual, now that's a novel idea)
that you place the item in question, empty, in the microwave, and also place a cup of water( in a know microwave safe container) along with it.
Run the microwave on full power for 1 minute and if the article in question gets hot,
and the water gets not so hot, the item it is not microwave safe.

I'll of course have to do more than that..

Constants:

-GE 1.4 cubic foot microwave oven rated 900 watts
-8 ounces of tap water in a Corelle cup (microwave safe) - water temperature in cup 60 degrees F,
as measured by instant read thermometer
-All items to be tested at room temperature, approximately 70 F

Test:

Place item to be tested in microwave:
Item to be tested on left side + cup of water on right
Run microwave on high for 1 minute

Results:

Item Item Temperature Water Temp in Mug

6in round Corelle bowl
REFERENCE no heating 120F

6in square bowl no heating 120F
8in square plate warm 90F
11in square plate warm 90F
3.5X4.5in mug warm 100F

Clearly the plates and mug absorb the microwaves.
Not going to use them for reheats.
Curios that square bowl was OK.
Experiments ended with one of each item because wife is yelling
“ What are you doing with all those dishes, you had better clean this mess up”
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