What do you use your microwave for?

My microwave provides a useful surface on which to deposit my wallet, phone, watch and keys when I get home from work…

…Oh you mean what do I put in it?

I reheat my dinner (Mrs Mangetout cooks for herself and the kids at 5.30; I get home at 6.30) and we warm milk for the kids, that’s it (occasionally we cook peas in it).

FIL and MIL, when they were married, never had a micro. Mr. Rilch once encouraged them to get one. FIL asked us why we had one.

Me: Well, I can boil water in a hurry.

FIL: Don’t need to boil water in a hurry.

Me: I can defrost stuff.

FIL: Don’t need to defrost stuff.

Me: And reheat stuff.

FIL: I don’t reheat anything.

Me: And, not that we do, but some people get those MREs, like Weight Watcher dinners, and you can only heat them in the nuke.

FIL: I don’t eat that stuff.

Me: And I can soften up butter for baking.

FIL: I don’t bake.

Later, Mr. Rilch grumbled, "Yeah, you don’t need a microwave because every meal you’ve had in your life’s been put in fronna you!

MIL and FIL divorced. MIL got a nuke shortly afterwards. FIL’s new wife also has one. FIL still doesn’t cook, though. He’s an Italian who can’t cook. Sad.

Mr. Rilch and I both cook, and we regard the micro as a specialized piece of equipment. The nuke applies heat faster and more evenly, just as the food processor slices and shreds things faster and more cleanly, and the blender mixes liquids far beyond the capabilities of modern (wo)man. I couldn’t make scalloped potatoes without the food processor. Mr. Rilch couldn’t make his protein shakes without the blender. Neither of us could do half of what we do in twice the time if we had to drag out a pan or fire up the oven every time we wanted to soften butter or boil water.

And people who leave meat out to defrost it make me shudder. Even if you don’t forget it’s there, you still shouldn’t give it so much time to pick up bacteria or let existing bacteria come to life.

Oh, and microwaving grapes! Someone on the old AOL board explained this: Cut two grapes in half, put in nuke so that the two “insides” (IOW, pulp without the skin are touching, and hit Power. Sparks!

[reminisce]Yeah, the old AOL “pushpin” board. I am truly an oldbie; I was on the board during its brief generic period, before the revamp. I think the only other reg here who can claim that is Opal. So what was that chick’s name…Judy or something…her username derived from her given name, which she used openly. She first gained notice when she asked whether microwaving a light bulb in a bowl of water would really make the bulb glow. She quickly became the board’s lab tech, trying every “experiment” that was even remotely mentioned. I think she’s the one who explained how to nuke grapes.[/reminisce]

I use mine to reheat stuff, of course, but I also cook veggies in it. Bacon can be cooked in it, too. My mother cooks rice in hers, but I’ve never had much success with it.

If you haven’t tried nuking your veggies, you should. They’re much tastier that way. I think that it’s a lot easier and nutritious. I even do my artichokes in the microwave.

Oh, and if I have something that I must leave at room temperature, but I can’t be in the kitchen all the time, I put it in the microwave. The cat is, in theory, not allowed on the countertops. However, he does not acknowledge this when nobody’s there.

Oh, all sorts of things. Primarily frozen food, and popcorn, though, as well as re-heating things.

Here’s a microwave confession though. I’m 24, and my parents bought their first microwave back in the early 80’s, so I basically have had one in the house for just about as long as I can remember. Last fall the then-current microwave died, and my parents put off buying a new one. I was at a total loss as to how to re-heat things without one. Ovens, in my mind, are used to cook things. I had no idea that you could re-heat things in an oven, the ignorance of which was re-enforced by all the wives in old shows scolding people to eat “before it gets cold.” So I bought them a new microwave…