What Is an Air Fryer? A Complete Guide to Your Searing Questions

Move over, deep fryer: there’s a new kitchen gadget in town. Air fryers are quickly becoming one of the most popular appliances, with chefs and home cooks relying on them to prepare delicious meals. But what is an air fryer, you may ask. This guide is here to help you understand the craze behind this modern tool, and perhaps even convince you to get one.

What is an air fryer?

An air fryer is a small cooking appliance. It’s much more compact than an oven, so it can fit easily on most counters. In a nutshell, it’s a modest convection oven that cooks food quickly and makes everything crispy on the outside.

It can be used to whip up a chicken dinner, roast vegetables, prepare fries, and a lot more. What truly makes it unique is the fact that even if you don’t add any oil to the food, you can still indulge in a tasty crunch.

How does an air fryer work?

Air fryers work similarly to traditional convection ovens. Inside the appliance, above the food basket, there’s a heating element and a fan. When you turn on the air fryer, hot air starts whirling around very rapidly. Because the food sits on a basket with slits, the hot air can easily reach every surface. Thus, your food is cooked quickly and gets surprisingly crunchy.

If that sounds complicated, it isn’t. This appliance is incredibly intuitive to use. Simply place your food in the basket (either on parchment paper, aluminum foil, or directly on the basket), and slide it in. Then, set the cooking temperature (the range is quite similar to that of most ovens) and a timer. Once the timer goes off, your food is ready, but you can always check on it while it cooks by pulling the basket toward you.

What’s the difference between an air fryer and an oven?

Even though air fryers and ovens both cook food, there are 2 major differences between them.

• For starters, most ovens can’t make food as crispy as air fryers can. If you were to cut a few potatoes into sticks, you’d get far crunchier fries if you use the air fryer.
• Secondly, air fryers also cook food much faster than conventional ovens. Whereas ovens need to be preheated, air fryers don’t, which already saves you time in the kitchen. On top of that, heat is transferred more efficiently in an air fryer, meaning you don’t need to wait as long for your food to get done.

Are air fryers healthy?

Air fryers are often touted as a healthy way of cooking food. If you’ve heard of these gadgets before, chances are you had already heard this.

Well, it’s not wrong. If you want to make crispy, crunchy foods, you’re much better off using an air fryer than a deep fryer. That’s because you don’t need to add fat to your food to cook it in an air fryer. The rapidly moving hot air takes care of that. Compared to deep fryers that use up several cups of vegetable oil, that’s a big win for air fryers.

That said, it can be easy to get carried away and only use an air fryer to prepare convenient store-bought foods. After all, chicken nuggets, fried, and onion rings are all delicious and incredibly easy to prepare using an air fryer. Yet, alone, they don’t make up a healthy, balanced diet. To even things out, air frying veggies (such as kale, carrots, cauliflower florets, and more) is a good way of adding healthy foods into your diet while still using this innovative gadget.

Are air fryers worth it or a fad?

If you’re still on the fence about air fryers, let’s break things down.

Advantages of an air fryer

Ask most home cooks and they’ll make these arguments to explain why they love this kitchen tool so much.

1. Air fryers prepare food very quickly, which makes them great for busy people.
2. At the end of the day, air fryers cost less money to run than ovens.
3. Because they’re compact, air fryers can fit into smaller kitchens.
4. They don’t require oil to prepare delicious, filling meals.
5. They’re incredibly versatile appliances.
6. The food basket is easy to remove and clean.

Disadvantages of an air fryer

As with everything, air fryers also have some downsides that are worth looking at.

1. You won’t get a nice crunch on foods coated in a wet batter.
2. Since they’re so small, you’ll need to cook in batches if planning to feed more than 3 people.

What can you make with an air fryer?

Versatility is one of the many strong suits of an air fryer. But you might be wondering what else besides fries you can make with them. The list isn’t short:

• Bacon, still tasty but not as greasy
• Chickpeas, coated in spices and crispy
• Homemade chicken nuggets
• Breaded catfish, with a squeeze of lemon
• Roasted carrots, Brussels sprouts, and other hard veggies
• Crispy spiced kale chips
• Cauliflower “chicken” wings
• Toasted slices of bread and bagels
• Donuts, airy and less greasy
• Banana bread, moist and sweet
• Chocolate cake, rich and quick to make

All in all, if a recipe can be made in the oven, chances are you can adapt it to be cooked on an air fryer. The big exception is foods with a wet batter, which do better in a deep fryer or in a shallow frying pan. Other than that, as a rule of thumb, shorten the cooking times and get creative.

Explore new tastes and textures with an air fryer

Air fryers let you broaden your culinary horizons by allowing you to experiment with new flavors and textures. Let you creativity run wild—and don’t let a few missing ingredients stop you from having fun in the kitchen. You can order whatever you need online via Instacart. A personal shopper will do the grocery run for you and deliver it on the same day.

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Instacart is the leading grocery technology company in North America, partnering with more than 1,400 national, regional, and local retail banners to deliver from more than 80,000 stores across more than 14,000 cities in North America. To read more Instacart posts, you can browse the company blog or search by keyword using the search bar at the top of the page.