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Comment by mabbo | Hacker News Reader

The bigger "Why wasn't I doing this sooner" with microwaves is using lower power modes.

They don't actually reduce the 'power' of the microwave, but they turn it on and then back off again for a proportion of time, over and over.

It takes longer to reheat stuff this way, but it comes out much more evenly heated, I find.

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Panasonic "inverter" microwaves actually do reduce the power output. It's one of my favorite features. On power level 1 you can actually soften butter without melting random pits into it.

Unfortunately, at least on my current model, the UX to access this feature is very bad: repeatedly pressing the "power" button until it reaches the desired level. I've had other microwaves where you just key in the desired power after pressing "power", and much prefer that method.

I don't know whether Panasonic has licensed this to any other manufacturer.

I also have the one from Panasonic, but I'm seeing other manufacturers advertise inverter technology on their microwaves recently.

>you can actually soften butter

Ooh that's a good use case. What else do you do with it?

Anything dense (e.g. lasagna, meatloaf, etc.) is good for a lower power level / more time trade-off. It will end up more evenly warm without the edges exploding. I usually use power 3 or 4 for these dense dishes.

Inverter microwave is not complex system so many microwaves in Japan supports it.

Stir or otherwise rearrange what you're heating every so often, too. Microwaves deliver energy mostly to the outside of what they're bombarding, so it improves heat distribution to mechanically move the heated parts toward the center and vice versa - this helps prevent the "burnt outside and still cold in the middle" problem.

Can confirm. I make omelet in a microwave sometimes and the center is always last to cook compared to an outside ring. I simply rearrange contents when it’s half-ready.

And on many microwaves, the “reheat” button is just a guided version of a low power mode.

The newer microwaves with a sensor reheat button are pretty great.

Some do operate in a "true" lower power mode (or at least in some mode that's indistinguishable to us). Ours does and it's great. But it's the first one I've had that actually does that; the rest have operated in lower power mode in the way you're describing.

The ones that have a true low power mode are called inverter microwaves and cost like twice as much. They may be worth it if you like to defrost food in the micro as it prevents the food from cooking

They are absolutely worth it! Easy defrosting, uniform reheating, less noise, especially if it’s a rotation-free model like Panasonic NN-DS596B.

Pretty crucial for defrosting. You really don't want to try to defrost a slab of lasagne say on 100%, 1kW or whatever, it's going to come out both just as frozen as when it went in and steaming hot ready to eat.

(I agree it applies just as well generally - but defrosting makes it more apparent/visible.)

> They don't actually reduce the 'power' of the microwave,

Depends on the microwave, you can get models that do adjust the power and they are very nice to use. Being able to slowly and evenly heat up food in the microwave is a huge game changer when it comes to how you use your microwave.

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