Superheating Water

I have a confession to make. I've marveled about this before... talked about it among friends... Daily, I am re-fascinated each time I heat a cup of water in the microwave... daily, at least on days that I drink instant coffee instead of taking time to make a pot.

I've found that if you take a smoothly glazed coffee cup, fill it with water (mine is always filtered), and heat it in the microwave... not quite long enough to make it boil (for me, this is 2 minutes on "hi")... you'll end up with a very interesting cup of hot water.

At this point, if you're not careful, when you add the instant coffee, you'll end up with an "explosion" of hot coffee. The first few times I did this, I had coffee all over the countertop and all over the floor. More than half of the water "exploded" out of the cup.

Now, I add the coffee slowly (with a spoon)... and watch... as each addition of coffee causes the mixture to boil a bit.

Not that instant coffee tastes "great", but I'm convinced that my instant coffee tastes better this way than if I boiled a pot of water, and added it to a cup filled with a teaspoon of instant coffee.

Here are a few links for further reading.

• Superheating and microwave ovens
• MICROWAVE ASSISTED HETEROGENEOUS AND HOMOGENEOUS REACTIONS
• Microwave Heating Mechanisms