I want to cook Turkish coffee on heated sand at school. I have difficulty accessing some easier method of heating, so I was going to try to heat sand in a microwave. It was then pointed out to me that sand, unlike water-dense foods, does not conduct electricity.
Will sand be heated by a microwave?
Best Answer
Well, I just put an empty glass plate in the microwave for 20 seconds and it did heat up ( hotter than my hand, maybe 40C), so people who think that silica does not absorb microwaves are wrong, at least for my microwave oven. I often heat up coffee in a glass, and the handle gets hot too, I was not sure it was not conduction from the coffee, so I tried the plate.
So I will agree with the other experimenter, Rob N, that sand which is mostly silica will heat up in the microwave.
Your problem then would be: to what temperature, as you will need excess of 100C to bring to a boil a turkish coffee. I think it will work, glass plates get really hot in the microwave.