About Donovan Fandre Expertise I had the only
nationally televised cooking series on microwave cooking that aired on
PBS and The Learning Channel for 8 years and I`ve also written 5 best
selling microwave cookbooks. I have been cooking by microwave for over 30 years and have accumulated expertise in cooking, defrosting, reheating, craft activities with microwave, dehydrating, and generally everything and anything pertaining to microwave use.
Experience
Past/Present clients Rubbermaid, Del Monte, Alaska Fish & Seafood, Sugar Council, LG Electronics
Question I wanted to heat up a plastic jar with peanut butter because I store it in the
fridge and there was just a little bit left. I put it on 20 seconds at high. What a
display of fireworks I got! (Seems there was a verrrrrry small piece of foil left on
the rim which caused it to arc.) Would this have damaged the microwave? I'm
afraid to use it again.
Answer Hey Kate, relax, you just experienced a little arcing from the thin strip of foil on the jar. The only damage that could occur would be to the jar itself because the arcing creates heat and if it were a plastic jar it could have melted a bit. Arcing will not harm your oven. Arcing occurs when there are gaps in metal placed in the oven and the microwaves jump between the gaps and discharge in a bow of light. If there are no gaps arcing will not occur. In fact metal can be used to enhance microwave cooking in several ways, primarily for shielding the food. In my cooking classes I demonstrate the use of foil or metal covers by placing several items in the oven and showing how the energy affects these items. You can do this experiment yourself to help understand metal in the microwave. Place in your microwave a carrot half of which is wrapped in foil. Turn on the oven for 1 minute and feel the carrot. The unwrapped half will be very hot and the half in the foil will be raw. If you want to create some arcs, loosely crumble a piece of foil and place it in the oven and it'll usually create a bunch of arcs for you to observe. Microwave energy cannot go through metal as it does with plastic, glass, ceramic, rubber, silicon, and other non-metallic containers. When microwaving turkeys you should cover the wings and ankles with foil or the concentration of energy on these thin parts will cause them to dry out and become inedible. Recently I had to defrost a pork loin and since it was rather large and I didn't want to use the whole thing, I wrapped half of it in foil so only the part that was bare would defrost and the part in the foil would remain frozen to be used another day. My kids used to scare their playmates by placing metal trimmed dishes in the microwave and watching the sparks fly as the trim burned off the plates. Don't use metal trimmed dishes or they will lose their value quickly. I hope this relieves your anxiety and you can continue healthy, fast, energy efficient, convenient microwave cooking.
