I was searching the internet earlier, trying to find out if food cooked in microwaves does actually cool down quicker, and if so why.
I still haven’t managed to find the answer (grrr) but I did come across this rather amusing but also alarming little story:
I don’t want to sound like I know everything in the world or even like I know quite a lot. But you had a question regarding “If a microwave oven door were to open while it was still on, what would happen? Could it hurt you?- JP”
Well ..Having the thought process that I have, kinda how should I put it? …Stupid? or inventive or even in-between. Well, my microwave door did happen to come off. Magic Chef 900-watt microwave. Well, I did my best to try to fix it but the hinge on one side did not attach properly, therefore having a gap between the door and the appliance. Being me (stupid) I wondered if it would burn fast or would it gradually warm up. I slid my finger between…You probably dying to hear what happened… But it didn’t gradually warm up at all. It was instant heat! It didn’t scar me or anything like that, but sure scared the H*** out of me to find out it got so hot so quick. I didn’t get any blisters either. But it just burned like touching something hot on the tip of my finger being that is the only thing I put in. Well you know the old adage, “You learn from your mistakes”, stands true. lol – Anonymous
Well I think I’ll be learning from that mistake too!!!
Acording to the reply on the board this was posted on, if the full 900 watts of power had been availible to the curious finger it would have been roasted quickly. Not a good thing!
randomtask 
Theory…
Surely the cooling of something is not dependent on HOW it was heated.
The main factors really would be how hot the food was in the first place, and the conditions of the surroundings once heated.
Here the obvious could be stated where if you have two cooked pies but place suspended mid-air inside a vacuum-box (kinda thermos style), and place the other in the fridge, you’ll find that not only have you attempted to defy physics, but you’ll possibly knacker your fridge.
Oh, and one pie will likely cool down quicker than the other, do the math, you figure out which…
But if you want to be more scientific, then you argue how the microwave works…
OK, it excites the liquid molecule in the food, get’s them moving, which in accordance to Boyle’s law, bores the arse off you thinking about the obvious, and kinda cooks it inside out(ish).
Then alternatively, with the oven, it heats from the outside, cooking it that way round.
Then there’s the speed of it; the microwave is like a "flash" cooking speed, whereas the oven cooks gently over time. This will give different result for different foods.
Example, you try cooking meat (like whole pieces of chicken) in a microwave and the result will be that it’s "tougher" than with using the oven. In the microwave, the water molecules escape from the chicken as steam quite easily and dry it out a little, whereas the gentle heating of the oven doesn’t have such a sudden power blast to get the steam leaking like a maniac.
Result? Moister oven chicken should stay hotter longer.
BUT…
If you do the same with pizza, the whole thing about cooking the pizza on the oven shelf without using a baking tray allows the heat to rise straight through the dough, giving the chance to dry out a little (but really just a little).
In a microwave, this doesn’t happen, the pizza’s matted down to the plate, weighed down my cheese and the fat that’s melted out of it, making a base more filled with moisture (than by cooking in an oven), so in THIS case, the microwaved pizza should stay hotter for longer.
Result? A hotter microwaved pizza, but it’s chewier, and generally not very nice.
My point?
Whether the food stays hotter for longer with a microwave is immaterial, coz either way, your food’s gonna turn out crap.
Remember, a microwave is a tool of convenience, and shouldn’t replace a generic oven. I maybe a sucker for using the microwave, but that’s only coz i’m too apathetic or impatient to do anything otherwise. Given the motivation and/or patience, give me a conventional oven anytime.
…at least, that’s my theory.
Any of the "facts" i said above may not be scientically correct, in which case i admit them being wrong, but my final statement remains…
Microwave cooking is bad.
Speaking of microwaves, here’s a completely relevent and related OK-Cupid update!
Friends with Rob = 83%
Friends with Andy = 84%
Friends with Row = 86%
…this leads me to conclude that i’m better friends with people who i’ve known for a shorter amount of time. The longer the friendship, the more the percentage creeps down, and i think the reason is this…
The longer someone’s known me, the more they’ve seen me drunk.
Now THERE’S something OK-Cupid doesn’t consider!
Well I totally agree with you that microwave food is never as good as ‘proper’ cooked food… and for that reason I haven’t used a microwave for one hell of a long time (about 8 months I think).
So from what I can gather from your theory, the main method of cooling food from a microwave is steam… an interesting idea I must admit. Here is what I was thinking;
As the microwaves only stimulate fat and water moecules, when you take the food out of the microwave oven, not only will it be loosing heat through radition and convection in the normal way but the average heat of the food will be going down as the heat from the water and fat molecules conducts and disipates to the other moecules in your food.
Incidently the reason a lot of microwave meals instruct you to stand for a minute after cooking is so localised heat pockets due to microwave interference in the oven can also spead more evenly around the food. In my opinion this would also cause some cooling (but prevent nasty burns when eating)
Yeah well I say it’s the tiny monkeys inside all food. They carry bunson burners and when they hear the buzzing of the microwave they are driven into a crazed frenzy where they attack the food from the inside with their burners… as to where they get the gas to power the aforementioned burners, you don’t want to know!
The reason you have to leave food after you remove it is so the monkeys can escape the food and escape the being eaten thing… as for whether it cools faster, well with no monkeys in your food it’s no longer cool so therefore it must be hot and er… yeah, I think that explains things nicely.
Doesn’t the amount of heat loss depend on the breed of the monkey?
I hear some brands prefer to branch off into the baboon group.
*blinks slowly*