The Best Tips And Tricks When Using Your Air Fryer

By now, most of us have an air fryer – and if you don’t have one, you’re probably sick of hearing that you need to get one. But honestly, these things are great. I found that my air fryer crept into my life with extraordinary stealth: What started as “I already have an oven, I don’t need this,” turned into, “why would I use the oven when I have this?” Speedy, efficient, and lower back-friendly, it’s used daily in my kitchen for pretty much everything. 

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But I still have things to learn about it, and so do we all. So, here are a few tips and tricks for your air fryer, which might just improve your experience with it ever-so-slightly. 

Make Sure To Wrap It Up

Air fryers are a quicker way to cook things like fish and chicken, but when you do this, they face a little more force than they might in a regular oven. The gale-force winds that surge through your appliance and buffet your food can also wick moisture away from it more speedily than if you were cooking it in both a fan and an electric oven, and as such, things can dry out very quickly. 

So, for more fragile foods that rely on moisture retention (like fish and chicken, but also other meats and some vegetables), it can be helpful to wrap them up with foil or parchment paper to create a steaming basket. You sacrifice some browning here, sure, but they’ll stay as they intended: Juicy. It’s worth pointing out, though, that if you’re happy for your food to be a bit drier but have more of a browning, then you can stick to your standard recipe; this is just if you’re sick of biting into mealy chicken breasts, marinated or not.

Skip (Or Replace) The Spray 

If your air fryer feels a bit grimmer than it should be, your spray might be to blame. Aerosol cooking sprays can contain emulsifiers like soy lecithin and propellants like propane or butane, which help them get out of the can and onto your food. The problem is that these ingredients can react with, stick to, and erode nonstick surfaces, like the kind you find in your air fryer basket – and because the winds blow pretty fiercely in these things, they can get everywhere.

So, top tip: Don’t use them. Instead, oil your food using a brush, or make an oil spray with a diffuser bottle and your favorite cooking oil. Make sure you pick an oil with a high smoke point, too, so you don’t end up giving your food a charred taste. 

Air Fry To Clean

I hate cleaning my air fryer. I’m pretty sure most people do. It’s my bad, though, because I didn’t know it was so easy. Once you’re done cooking, squirt a small amount of dish soap into your air fryer basket, followed by a cup of water. Then, run it for a few minutes. The water and soap will heat up and steam the inside of the basket, loosening any food residue and making it easier to wipe away.