By Bryan Wall
Product Test Journalist | Kaipūrongo Whakamātautau Hautaonga
Dry, messy, soggy or downright dangerous – here are the foods you should keep out of your air fryer.
Air fryer devotees might tell you it’s a one-stop shop for cooking anything. But if you put the wrong food in the basket, you could end up with a soggy mess or, worse still, a fire hazard. Here are the foods to keep away from your air fryer and leave to more traditional methods.
1. Wet battered foods
What’s the best fried food? Fish and chips, of course. Sadly, you won’t be able to replicate a visit to the local chippy using your air fryer. Wet battered foods just won’t work in one. Batter needs to be cooked rapidly in hot oil, and in the air fryer, it will just drip through the basket before it’s cooked and then become a lump of batter next to your dry fried fish. Unpleasant.
I’ve tried making thicker batters, which does work a little better, and you can of course air-fry that very disappointing pre-battered frozen fish from the supermarket. But nothing really compares to the real deal on a Friday night.
2. Burgers
Another food that really should be cooked in a fry pan or on a grill plate. I’m a big fan of “smash burgers”, where you compress the patty down onto a hot plate or pan and cook it rapidly, caramelising the outer and keeping the inner moist. You’ll never achieve this in an air fryer. What you will achieve is a dry slab of mince.
3. Popcorn
You wouldn’t cook popcorn in your regular oven, so why bother trying in the air fryer? It can also be dangerous if popped corn gets blown around onto the element, or the paper bag could catch fire if you’re cooking the pre-bagged type. Just stick with the microwave or stovetop method for popcorn and save a potential disaster.
4. Eggs
Fried, scrambled or poached eggs are a faff to do in the air fryer and don’t come out as well as they would using a traditional method. The one exception is boiled eggs – I found that around 8 minutes in the basket at 120°C gave me perfect soft-boiled eggs. Just pray they don’t break whilst they rattle around inside!
5. Anything fatty
Hot fat tends to splatter all over the place, so cooking bacon or other fatty foods in an air fryer could lead to a fire. And fat is also a pain to clean off the inside, especially around the heating element. Stick to cooking lower-fat foods in your air fryer (bonus, they’re better for you!).
6. Foods cooked in liquids
Leave the cooking of rice, pasta, stews and soups to the cooktop or microwave. It’ll take too long in the air fryer and could get quite messy!
7. Baking paper
Ok, not actually food, but if you are considering baking in the air fryer, don’t preheat with the baking paper inside – it can get blown up onto the element and set alight. Take it from someone who knows!
8. Large cuts of meat
If you’re trying to cram a large chook into your air fryer, then think again. Smaller cuts of meat like racks of lamb work nicely (as long as they aren’t too fatty, remember!), but if you don’t leave enough space around your meat for the hot air to circulate, it will never cook evenly. It’ll also take an age, and we’ve found that, generally, if you’re cooking for over 30 minutes, your normal oven is more efficient and cost effective.
The best air fryer
If you want an air fryer that gives you a bit more flexibility over what you can cook, you could choose the top-performing model in our test:
