Microwaves are great cooking tools, they might not be the healthiest way to go but they sure do save time. Here are some tips to keep that cooking green:
The greenest, and safest, way to cook in a microwave is to cover your food using oven-safe glass cookware, which eliminates waste and the potential for chemicals leaching from plastic wrap.
“Microwave-safe” containers only means that the plastic won’t melt or crack in the microwave, but doesn’t guarantee that it won’t leach chemicals into your leftovers.
If you DO use plastic, only loosely cover your food, allowing steam to escape, and NEVER let plastic wrap touch food directly.
Only use ink-free paper towels in the microwave. Most printed paper towels use non-food-grade inks. (blech)
Never cover food with plastic bags, aluminum foil, grocery bags, or newspapers.
Author: Jack Reichert
As far back as he can remember Jack Reichert has been interested in the environment. In the second grade, he rallied all of his classmates to donate one recess a week to cleaning up litter from the schoolyard. That was the same year that a city councilman asked him to help with his campaign because of the letter Jack had written asking him to clean up Boston Harbor. Ever since Jack has followed the development of the international green conscience with anticipation and hope that one day we will treat Mother Earth with the respect she deserves and not turn her into another Giving Tree. For tips, feedback and prophet sightings, Jack can be reached at jack (at) greenprophet (dot) com.
There doesn’t seem to be any real evidence that microwave ovens damage nutrients or food any more than other forms of heat.
Low power settings on a microwave oven just turn the heat on and off – it doesn’t mean that there are fewer or weaker microwaves. for example, a 50% setting means that there are equal time periods of heating and non-heating.
I was wondering if microwaving on low power would limit the potential damage to nutrients that some say occur when one micorwaves their food. Have there been any studies on this??