It’s the starting and stopping, the opening and closing, that can make microwaving annoying. But Ms. Kafka is right: if you err on the side of undercooking, you can’t go far wrong. So if you’re using an older recipe, start by cutting either the time or the power in half. Take notes; they will help you the next time you make a recipe from the same source.

One of the real beauties of the oven is that when the timer goes off, the thing stops heating. You can set your asparagus for two minutes and go for a walk; when you come back it’ll be “parboiled.” Try that on top of the stove!

I was starting to think the microwave needed a new name that would reflect the thing it does best. Something like “the whiz-bang steaming oven.” Reinvigorated and inspired, I reviewed the reader suggestions I’d asked for on Bitten.

Most, not surprisingly, were for vegetables. Some went farther afield, and these I pursued with mixed and mostly unconvincing results. Toasting nuts and spices: yes, but not easier than stovetop. Poaching or scrambling eggs: fast, but unreliable beyond belief. (I have never had a harder scrambled egg.) Melting butter or chocolate: yes, but if your timing is off, you’ll make a mess and possibly burn the chocolate. “Baked” apple: a nice snack.

The microwave does a fine job on rice, saving you a pot because you can do it in your serving dish, as long as you can figure out how to set your oven so that the water doesn’t boil over, meaning you have to wash the carousel. (One-and-a-half times as much water as rice, salt, plastic wrap with a vent slit cut in it, about 12 minutes at full power.) But risotto, no, at least not for me; all the stirring makes it more trouble than it’s worth. It’s the same for chicken stock, which I’d rather make by the gallon than by the quart, thank you.

My conclusion to that point was, if you can steam it, you can microwave it. But only with vegetables was the improvement clear.

Image A microwave curry makes good use of steamed eggplant. Credit... Andrew Scrivani for The New York Times

Two reader suggestions opened my eyes. A young woman from Riverdale named Mee-Lise Robinson suggested flourless chocolate cake, and a number of other readers suggested puddings. With both of those dishes, you want low heat and no crust: what would make normal cakes a failure are just what the microwave is good at.