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How Microwaves Cook Food. When you hit the start button it usually takes about 2 seconds to heat up a filament inside the magnetron tube, says Schiffmann. The microwaves are then blasted into the food compartment. The commonly used frequency of microwaves, 2.45 gigahertz, is easily absorbed by water, fat, and sugar.
Microwave ovens work by passing microwave-band electromagnetic radiation over the food at 2.5 GHz. Molecules that are electric dipoles, of which water is the most efficient, rotate back and forth in this field. The friction between them creates heat. This is called dielectric heating.