Chapter 1: The science in the kitchen

The kitchen is the place of our house where we have a lot of science and we don’t realise about it. So, we will consider some aspects to known a little more about this.

Do you know how the microwaves oven cooks foods and why it can heat the food and not the container?

Well, the answer is complicated because we have to use some physics but we can explain it without calculations in an intuitive way.

The microwaves produce changes in the vibration of the water molecules. It increases his vibration. When you increase the vibration of a molecule you are increasing his energy, so you are increasing his temperature. On the other hand, all the foods contain water molecules. I suppose that now you can ask the first question of today…. Yes, you are right! When you put your food in the microwaves, the water molecules increase their energy so they can heat the zone around them. And after a time it does that your food is ready for eat.

The second question has the same explanation because if you don’t have water molecules in the composition of the container, you can’t heat it. This is the microwaves oven secret; it only can heat if there are water molecules.