An air fryer is arguably one of the best inventions for kitchen use. It makes cooking easy and less stressful. And if you’re someone who hates the splashing, crackling, and popping that goes on while frying, your best bet is an air fryer.
It is a cooking appliance that works similarly to an oven, but it can also be used for foods that require deep frying, grilling, roasting, baking, and frying. Using an air fryer gives your food a crispy outside and tender inside, something a traditional frying pan cannot provide. Compared with an oven, it is also a faster way of cooking.
How does it work?
The air fryer does not actually fry your food, at least not in the way we know frying to be. It doesn’t use the volume of oil used when cooking with a typical frying pan. This is why many people insist on it as a healthy way of cooking. If your doctor has advised you to steer clear of oily foods, but you still crave fried things, using an air fryer to cook may just be the compromise you were looking for.
The air fryer circulates hot air rapidly through its interior for heating and cooking. Many air fryers contain perforated baskets or trays that allow this heat to reach every part of the cooked food.
What is an air fryer used for?
Many use air fryers to grill, roast, bake, and fry foods. More than these, an air fryer is also helpful for warming frozen foods or reheating food that has gone cold.
Some of the foods you can make using an air fryer include roasted plantain (boli), roasted potatoes or yam, grilled chicken wings, french fries, and pastries like spring rolls. Many times, using an air fryer for these meals even produces better results than an over or frying pan will give.
- N.B: A deep fryer is not a type of air fryer. It uses sufficient oil for cooking, and unlike the air fryer, it only works for deep frying.
How to use an air fryer
Using an air fryer is not rocket science. The steps required are very basic and many times, following a recipe guides you through this already.
This is, however, a guide for first-time users or a refresher course for those who have once used an air fryer.
Preheating the air fryer
Before using your air fryer, it is good to preheat it. This is, however, still a personal choice and depends on preference.
Preheating your air fryer before use is suitable for many reasons. One primary reason is that it gives your food optimum heat for quicker cooking. This also allows it to have that brownish tint without burning the food.
Moreover, insects like cockroaches and spiders sometimes use the air fryer as a hibernating spot. This is not necessarily a matter of whether you clean your air fryer well. It just happens like that sometimes. Preheating the air fryer will force these insects out of it before you put your food in it.
For people who cook to sell to others, preheating your air fryer before use helps you get a consistent result when cooking. The ideal time for preheating your air fryer is five to ten minutes, depending on what you are cooking and the quantity.
However, for foods that tend to brown quickly, pre-heating your air fryer may not be a good idea, since it will only leave the center tender and uncooked even when the edges are already getting burnt.
Prepping your food for cooking
While your air fryer is getting heated up, prepping your food is the next thing to do. How you prepare it will determine if you will get an optimum result.
Vegetables and proteins are better cooked when they have been pre-coated with a bit of oil. A light coat of oil is emphasized to prevent your food from getting too greasy; remember, the air fryer tray is already non-stick. Avoid using non-stick sprays because these sprays usually contain chemicals that chip off the coating of the air fryer.
If you are cooking food that has been previously marinated, ensure that there is no extra liquid around the food. This is to prevent splattering and smoking during the cooking process. Also, this helps ensure a crisp texture of the food.
Selecting the right temperature
Selecting the right temperature is probably one of the most challenging things about using the air fryer. If it is too hot, your food gets burnt, too cold, and it takes too long to cook and the overall outcome of the cooking process is disappointing.
Some manufacturers have made life easy by providing guide buttons on their air fryers to direct users on what temperature to use for food. But some other manufacturers have not been kind enough (just kidding).
There is no hard and fast rule to setting the temperature for your air fryer. It all depends on what you are cooking and what your cooking goal is. The first thing to do is select the cooking you are going for. Is it a grill, roast, or fry?
The ideal temperature for french fries and steak (meat) is 204 degrees Celsius. For baking, 177 degrees Celsius is preferred. Chicken and fish should be grilled at temperatures between 190 degrees to 195 degrees Celsius.
A rule of thumb is to set your air fryer to a temperature 25 degrees lower than what you would go for with your conventional oven.
Air fryers can also be used to reheat frozen or cold food. To get the optimum temperature for a reheating procedure, set your air fryer to a temperature 30 degrees lower than what you would use for cooking.
A pro tip for using an air fryer is that you should never let it be overcrowded. If you, for example, are air frying french fries, do not load the basket so much that the fries are stacked over one another. This prevents equal heat circulation, causing some parts of your food to be overdone while some are undercooked.
Selecting the right cooking time
Knowing the right temperature for cooking is not enough. You also need to know the proper cooking time for each food. Although this varies from recipe to recipe, it is usually around the same range for each type of food.
Roasting a whole chicken would take as long as one hour, while chicken wings, fish fillets, and steak typically take less than twenty minutes to get done. You may need to air fry it for up to twenty-five minutes to get that golden brown consistency in french fries. Vegetables usually take a short time, ranging from five to ten minutes. For potatoes, a cooking time of twenty minutes is optimal.
Turning and stirring your food during cooking is essential to ensure the heat reaches every part evenly and the batch gets cooked together.
Here is some advice for you: never trust the timer altogether. You can also check the food at intervals while it cooks to ensure it does not get cooked beyond your desired result before the stipulated time. The cooking time varies depending on the recipe, the type of air fryer used, the cooking procedure, and personal preference.
Foods to not cook in an air fryer
As multipurpose as the air fryer may seem, some foods should never be cooked in it. Cheesy foods, popcorn, foods with wet batters, and sauce should not be cooked with an air fryer. This can cause the air fryer to smoke, make your food unedible, or worse, cause damage to the air fryer.
Care for the air fryer
Proper use of an air fryer includes adequate care for it. If you do not clean your air fryer after use, the crumbs or oil deposits left by the food will make the air fryer smoke upon subsequent use.
Failure to clean your air fryer could also make it a breeding spot for insects and other unwanted things like microorganisms. Besides causing possible irreversible damage to your air fryer, using it will also make it unsafe for your health.
Air fryer safety
- Remember that your air fryer is not a traditional frying instrument so you should never replace it with oil.
- Please do not put it in a cramped space during use. Always allow the air fryer to have enough ventilation because it produces heat. If this heat is not allowed to flow out quickly, it could cause a hazard.
- Always remember to unplug the air fryer when it is not in use. A power surge could damage it.
- Reading the user’s manual before use will also help you know how to keep your air fryer safe.
- Avoid cooking high-fat foods like bacon inside an air fryer. The excess fat can cause smoking in your air fryer. It could also be hazardous if you suddenly open the air fryer.
