
Why is it so hard to find a completely no-plastic microwave popcorn popper? Even the microwave popcorn poppers whose big selling points are either “Silicone bowl!” or “Temperature Safe Glass!” have plastic lids. Which means that plastic being heated up nice and hot in your microwave along with your popcorn. And even if the plastic is BPA-free, who wants that??
(Of course, I try not to think about all the years when I was using my Presto hot air popcorn popper – when the popcorn flowing out of it into the bowl was being ushered through a tunnel made entirely of plastic on a jet of hot air, ewww!)
In fact I made the mistake of ordering the temperature-safe glass one, thinking that the non-glass top was likely silicone and that if it wasn’t maybe I could find something in my kitchen that was silicone and that would work. Then I wrote to the company and asked them point blank of what the top was made. I never got a response. I did use a silicone steamer to cover the top, and it worked moderately well, but not great.
Then it struck me.
My Pyrex casserole dish, which has its own… wait for it… glass lid!
I started experimenting. And what do you know!
Not only does it work, but it works better than any of the microwave popcorn poppers I’ve tried! Including the glass one, and the Cuisinart one with the silicone bowl and the plastic top.
Having figured out the ideal length of time to heat it, I have it perfected so that there are very few unpopped kernels left, far fewer than with any of the many microwave popcorn poppers I’ve tried! Also, does anyone know why the unpopped kernals are called ‘old maids’??
The key to using your Pyrex (now Anchor Hocking, as Anchor Hocking acquired Pyrex in 2024) casserole dish to make perfect popcorn in your microwave is two-fold:
1. Determine the optimum popping time, and
2. Use 1/3 cup unpopped popcorn, and shape it like a doughnut in the bottom of the casserole dish (so leave the center of the dish free of popcorn kernels).
Oh, also, no oil or anything else, just dry, unpopped popcorn kernels.
After experimenting with different lengths of time, I have determined that the idea amount of time for my GE 1.7 cu foot, 1000 watt microwave is 7 to 7 1/2 minutes. Now I don’t even have to attend to it at all, I just put it in, hit 6.5 minutes, and can walk away, coming back to perfectly popped popcorn, no plastic. :~)
If you don’t already have a Pyrex (again, now Anchor Hocking) 2-quart covered casserole you can get one on Amazon here (NOT an affiliate link!):
https://www.amazon.com/Anchor-Hocking-2-Quart-Basics-Casserole/dp/B009T9A1YI/