Jennifer O’Connell: I only have one regret about my air fryer
Instagram made me do it. It was March 2021, and late-stage pandemic fatigue had set in. I was on the hunt for more pointless fripperies on which to spend the money I wasn’t spending on having fun (and didn’t yet know I’d need for utility bills and diesel for the car). Out of nowhere, air fryers were all over my Instagram feed. And, as is the way with Instagram ads during a pandemic, I was possessed with an urgent, powerful longing to own one.
For the uninitiated, an air fryer has little to do with frying. It looks like a deep-fat fryer, but it is effectively a mini-oven with its heating element located on top, and a powerful fan. Our Ninja Air Fryer Max can bake, roast, reheat or – something we’ve yet to feel compelled to try – dehydrate fruit and vegetables. It is a cinch to clean, cooks things evenly, heats instantly, and requires little or no oil, so it’s kinder to the planet and your heart. Newer models are capable of doing all sorts of things like slow cooking and pressure cooking. The pros are the efficiency, the crispness of the food, the benefits of using less oil; the main cons are that you have to cook large quantities in batches, the small basket is not ideal for baking and it can’t cope with saucy foods.
Eighteen months on, it is the one pandemic purchase I’ve had no cause to regret – well, almost none. Ours is used daily, often instead of the oven. We use it to cook all kinds of meat and vegetables – anything you might roast, like carrots, peppers or butternut squash, as well as broccoli or cauliflower, and it makes the best crispy roast potatoes. Despite what you might have heard, air fryer chips are every bit as good as deep fat fryer chips as long as you use Maris Piper or Rooster potatoes and don’t overcrowd the basket. A guideline is to take anything you would cook in the oven, reduce the temperature by 20 degrees and the time by 20 per cent.
It is dead handy for quick lunches such as wraps or toasties – my eight-year-old taught herself to make French bread pizza in it. Among our favourite go-to recipes are Kevin Dundon’s air fryer chicken wings and my own take on Ballymaloe baked eggs. But you can be as adventurous as you like. My husband recently whipped up a moreish brunch of air fryer stuffed chicken burritos with Mexican rice.
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Verdict: That one regret? I wish we’d gone for the biggest size available. And so, the number one thing on my Christmas list is the Ninja 11-in-1.
Mary Minihan: Only an eejit would put broccoli in an air fryer, right?
Space is at a premium in my cramped kitchen, so I’m sceptical about acquiring another contraption that might end up in the cupboard where gadgets go to die. But when the air fryer arrives, just before lunchtime, I find it doesn’t take up much more countertop real estate than the kettle.
While unwrapping a pack of sausages, I scan the air fryer instruction booklet, which appears to suggest no oil is required for this item, and select the “pork” icon on the digital touchscreen. Eight to 12 minutes’ cooking time is suggested.
Meanwhile, I have the oven on, heating up an aubergine parmigiana dish for us adults. I didn’t replace my microwave after it gave up the ghost a while back. I throw a few waffles into the oven for the kids and pasta is bubbling away on the hob.
When the sausages are cooked, the fatty deposits at the bottom of the detachable basket, which contains a removable “crisping plate”, look unappetising. The instructions say the basket and plate can go in the dishwasher but I won’t be putting that on until later, so I wash them by hand. It feels slightly faffy and I wonder what I’ve saved by not cooking the sausages on the hob or in the oven.
Verdict? The youngest (aged six) gives the sausages “10 out of 10″, while the more discerning elder (nine) awards a 7.5.
We consult the box to see what else we could make. There are photographs of stuffed peppers, sweet potato fries and chicken drumsticks, and I’m surprised to see cupcakes and chocolate cake.
I’ve never made chips in my life but decide to try them tonight.
The crisping plate is small - 15.5cm in diameter - so I cook each dinner item individually. I’m not sure how to keep everything warm bar turning on the oven again. I have it on to heat up a vegetable bake anyway.
I start cooking a lamb burger for the eldest. You’re supposed to brush with oil. The patty is quite thick and it’s not done within the allocated time for a steak burger (again, eight to 12 minutes). The instructions say: “If in doubt, cook it a bit more.”
I put the burger in the oven to keep it warm and wash the basket and plate, then put some chicken goujons on for the youngest, then put them in the oven too. When they come out they are clearly overdone but “10 out of 10″ says Mr Easy-to-Please. The burger is pronounced “very nice. I could eat it for dinner any day except Saturday.”
The chips don’t taste great to me but You-Know-Who says “10 out of 10″, though adds: “If they were a bit smaller and a bit longer then I’d like them more because then they’d be like McDonald’s chips”.
There aren’t too many foods I’d relish eating on the list the instruction booklet gives guidance on, although salmon fillet, jacket potatoes and “Mixed Mediterranean vegetables” are there, so I try to assemble a dinner from those.
The potatoes take an age, much longer than the 30-40 minutes suggested, but they are large. They’ll stay hot in their skins.
Two darnes are a snug fit in the basket but the salmon is the best thing to come out of the air fryer yet. It looks appetising and there is very little oily residue.
Dinner’s been going on a bit by this stage so we don’t wait for them, but the “Mixed Mediterranean Vegetables” - aka a courgette, an aubergine and a red onion - turn out fine.
Only an eejit would put broccoli in an air fryer, right? It’s the only vegetable the kids eat, and that’s good enough for me right now. I’m confident their palates will expand with age. I know the broccoli won’t work, but it is pictured on the box. “Terrible,” says the eldest, rating it two out of 10, while there’s a damning “one out of three” from the youngest.
Air fryers probably suit households where everyone eats the same thing. But even if that was the case, it would still take quite a while to get dinner on the table with this model.
The conclusion is probably obvious: we’re going to need a bigger air fryer.
Verdict: This little one might be joining the chef’s flamer, smoothie maker and electric knife in the gizmo graveyard.
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When writing a book all about deep frying (Hot Fat, from the Blasta Books series) last year, we did our due process. We invested in an air fryer to make sure we tested as many recipes in it as we could, knowing how popular the machines have been and how they have often been marketed as an alternative to the deep-fat fryer. We are happy to report almost 100 per cent disappointment. It just didn’t work –– wet batters were sticky disasters, floury coatings came out still uncooked, chips were desert-dry and patchwork-coloured, and you just can’t do things like donuts, lasagne bites or tempura oysters in an air fryer.
The reason being the air fryer is a countertop cousin of the oven, and not even a distant relative of the deep fryer. The notion that the air fryer is a dupe for the deep fryer is nonsensical: there’s no way blowing hot air around foodstuffs can achieve the same shattering crisp and delectable crunch that submerging in hot oil offers. As we wrote, you wouldn’t use a kettle to toast a piece of bread, so why would you use an air fryer when the requirement is frying in fat?
Don’t get us wrong, we still use the air fryer regularly, but only for things it does successfully. It was a worthy investment –– a great piece of kit that heats and cools unbelievably fast as an ideal, smaller-form substitute for the oven or grill. It’s clunky (like the deep fryer) but we’ve got an under-counter cupboard that houses all our clunky equipment, and the air fryer is taken in and out regularly.
Here’s what we do recommend it for: sausages and bacon, garlic bread, open-faced toasties, heating frozen things like jambons or chicken tenders, reheating (thus re-crisping) previously fried foods that have gone cold (like our fried chicken recipe or speedy nuggs), smaller joints of meat like pork belly, and also for slowly-roasting the likes of chicken skin – which crisp fabulously for a snack, and then the fat collects at the bottom, ideal for use in a chicken-fat mayo.
Verdict: The air fryer has its place, just don’t lie to yourself pretending it’s achieving something that it’s not.
