Microwave directly heats the surface of the food instead of a pan or pot. So it’s likely more energy efficient too.
Side note: There’s a myth that microwaves heat from inside out. This isn’t true. The microwave energy is almost entirely absorbed by the time it only gets a few millimeters into most foods. You can pretty easily test this by microwaving dense foods like a potato for only a few seconds, and measuring the cross section temperatures.
As I understand it, those particular (2.4 GHz) waves resonate with the water molecules and therefore actually specifically heat up any contained water.
So, if you have food that’s dry on the outside, it should actually heat up the inside more, which is probably why that is widely believed.
Microwave directly heats the surface of the food instead of a pan or pot. So it’s likely more energy efficient too.
Side note: There’s a myth that microwaves heat from inside out. This isn’t true. The microwave energy is almost entirely absorbed by the time it only gets a few millimeters into most foods. You can pretty easily test this by microwaving dense foods like a potato for only a few seconds, and measuring the cross section temperatures.
As I understand it, those particular (2.4 GHz) waves resonate with the water molecules and therefore actually specifically heat up any contained water.
So, if you have food that’s dry on the outside, it should actually heat up the inside more, which is probably why that is widely believed.