The microwave oven is mostly considered a standard equipment in all modern kitchens. But despite it’s being a complicated piece of electronic appliance, it is mostly an underutilized piece of equipment in most homes. Let’s face it, microwaves are mostly often used just to reheat leftovers or to pop microwave popcorn. It’s a very limited use of what is potentially a very versatile equipment. Below are some other culinary uses of microwaves that you can do as well.
A microwave oven’s quick application of heat on things makes it the perfect equipment to use if you want to quickly melt food items. For example, in baking one of the most commonly used ingredients are butter and chocolates. There are recipes that require softened butter or melted chocolate. But using a stove to soften butter complicates things because you’re liable to completely melt the butter before you even soften it through. The same goes for chocolates. Melting chocolate over the stove can be tricky. First you need to use a bain marie or improvise one, then you have to make sure that it is constantly stirred so it won’t granulate. It’s just big production. But with a microwave, just pop your butter or your chocolate and you’ll be sure that it’s melted or softened without any danger of overdoing it (as long as you do the microwaving in short bursts). You can also soften other food ingredients like cream cheese or even ice cream in the microwave.
Sometimes brown sugar hardens when it’s store for a long time and the container is not properly sealed. To soften brown sugar, just put the sugar in a bowl (make sure it is safe to use in microwave ovens) and sprinkle a teaspoon of water. Microwave it in low using short one minute bursts and tossing the sugar in between cycles.
You can actually warm tortillas in the microwave. The trick is to use a damp paper towel and wrapping it on the tortilla. A 40 second to one minute blitz in the oven is enough to warm it thoroughly.
A little known use of microwave ovens is for toasting. You can actually toast bread crumbs and coconut in the oven. Just spread these ingredients in microwave safe plate and blitzing it in one minute intervals, tossing it in between. You can stop when the crumbs or the coconut begins to brown.
Cooking bacon in the microwave may sound farfetched but it’s actually doable. All you need to do is to put bacon in between a few layers of paper towels and place it on a dish that is relatively deep and put it in the microwave. Blitzing the bacon on High for four to five minutes will cook the bacon.
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