bhayes@glacier.ARPA (Barry Hayes) (12/16/85)
I've been making popcorn in the office microwave for a while now, and a few small problems keep showing up. I often get a yield of about 2/3, and if I leave it in much longer it begins to smoulder. I've been thinking about trying to introduce the neon/helium atmosphere microwave, but I don't think the market's ready. I use store-bought bulk in a paper bag, oven on medium for about 6 minutes. I get a good yield from the 'corn with hot air or oil methods. Clues? -Barry Hayes bhayes@glacier
reid@glacier.ARPA (Brian Reid) (12/16/85)
The secret to cooking popcorn, whether in a microwave or anywhere else, is to maximize the rate of flow of heat into the popcorn. When you cook in hot oil, you have about 1200 watts of energy being conducted into the corn by a relatively efficient conductor of heat (the oil). When you cook in a microwave, you have (typically) 650 to 900 watts of energy being transmitted to the corn in a poor impedance match. When you heat popcorn too slowly, the steam forms slowly and leaks out of each kernel rather than exploding it. The trick is to make sure that there is as little heat as possible lost to the surrounding environs, by insulating the bag from the floor of the microwave oven. When you buy Pillsbury Microwave popcorn they give you a special bag for heating the popcorn in, and they give you a little cardboard gadget to put underneath the popcorn. The thing that is special about the special bag is that is has a plastic liner, which traps moisture, which causes the air inside the bag to become extremely hot, which in turn reduces the amount that the corn kernels get cooled by conduction as they cook. The thing that is special about the little cardboard gadget is that it is an insulator, which prevents heat loss out of the botton of the bag into the liner of the microwave oven. The first thing you should do is to insulate your cooking bag from the floor of the microwave oven. I recommend using several layers of corrugated cardboard box, cut to a nice 9 inch square and taped together into a nonmetallic insulating pad. The second thing you should do is to find a cooking bag that has a polyethylene vapor barrier. Common sources of such bags: * airline airsickness bags (they are a little small) * Pillsbury microwave popcorn bags (open them carefully and re-use them) * Peet's coffee bags (Peet's is an SF mailorder coffee company) Of course your first 5 batches will smell like French Roast, but them's the breaks. -- Brian Reid decwrl!glacier!reid Stanford reid@SU-Glacier.ARPA
figmo@lll-crg.ARpA (Lynn Gold) (12/17/85)
In article <2457@glacier.ARPA>, bhayes@glacier.ARPA (Barry Hayes) writes: > I've been making popcorn in the office microwave for a while now, and > a few small problems keep showing up. I often get a yield of about 2/3, > and if I leave it in much longer it begins to smoulder. I've been > thinking about trying to introduce the neon/helium atmosphere microwave, > but I don't think the market's ready. > > I use store-bought bulk in a paper bag, oven on medium for about 6 minutes. > I get a good yield from the 'corn with hot air or oil methods. Clues? > -Barry Hayes > bhayes@glacier Microwaved popcorn in general gives lousy yields. I am drawing a blank as to where I read this, but because of the way microwaves heat -- by causing water molecules to vibrate, and because of the low moisture content of popcorn kernels (and the even lower water content of oil), many of the kernels tend to dry out rather than pop. If you really want to use the microwave, I suggest using a dish which absorbs heat on the bottom (especially made for microwaves), preheat it with oil on the bottom, and then add your kernels. --Lynn Gold UUCP: ...lll-crg!figmo ARPA: Lynn%PANDA@SUMEX-AIM.ARPA