Well yeah but it heats up a lot faster using a lot less energy
And it moves way more air than a normal oven, thus removing water vapor faster. This water vapor that partly steams the food, resulting in moisture saturated air that in turn prevents more moisture from escaping, is the main difference between a frying pan and an oven. A deep fryer replaces the water with oil, an air fryer just extracts the water quicker. Both prevent the food from cooking in water or steam, resulting in a crispy texture.
I was very surprised that it cooked such moist chicken breasts without drying them out, I think you possibly just explained why that is! 😅
Everyone misquoting the guy telling you that you read the sentence wrong, and ignoring that you already said the breasts came out juicier in an air fryer. (they do)
They have the reading comprehension of baboons
Didn’t they say it does stuff out quicker?
Hold on let me read it again for ya -
This water vapor that partly steams the food, resulting in moisture saturated air that in turn prevents more moisture from escaping
They’re not the one with reading comprehension problems. OP said the air fryer removes that moist air more quickly, which would dry it out faster.
Dude.
The first sentence:
it moves way more air than a normal oven, thus removing water vapor faster.
Says that the sentence you quoted applies less with an air fryer than a conventional oven.
This water vapor that partly steams the food [is removed more slowly in a conventional oven], resulting in moisture saturated air that in turn prevents more moisture from escaping
The past three houses I’ve lived in have had convection ovens; I thought convection mode was fairly common by now.
I’ve seen them commonly in homes in Europe, but I’ve not seen them once in the US. But even convection ovens are not as effective as air fryers because they’re not as efficiently designed. They use the same principle, but the shape and fan power to volume ratio in air fryers is much better. Also, not all air fryers are the same, some are way more effective than others.
Every place I’ve ever rented has had the cheapest possible electric coil stove with no features, some of them didn’t even have a “clean” setting.
Oh, yeah. It’s been a long while since I’ve lived in that environment. You’re probably right that most cheap stand-alone stovetop/oven units don’t have a convection setting.
And 3/4 work (on a good day)
Never even heard of electric stoves with a clean function. Never seen a gas stove.
The clean function locks the door, cranks up the heat, and burns off all the crud in the oven. You can vacuum any ashes left after it cools down. Its awesome if you’re lazy like me. I have zero interest in bringing out the Easy Off and elbow length rubber gloves.
This is the big thing. So many times we want to heat up some left-overs and that would turn soggy in a microwave, but heating up the oven to reheat a few square inches of food is a vast waste of energy.
These take up a lot of space, though. I think one of those double ovens, where one is only tall enough for one tray, would be ideal. Convection, of course, but I haven’t seen a built-in without a convection mode in years.
You mean like a… Convection oven!!!
It absolutely is a convection oven however the rate of airflow is faster therefore the reaction is more pronounced.
Exactly, and most Americans don’t even have a convection oven either, so in that case the air fryer is functionally different from their oven.
I’m not here to convert you, but this is just as dismissive as OP. Yes it’s a convection oven. We also have a full size convection oven. It does not cook things as dramatically faster as an air fryer does. It’s not the same experience at all.
I say this as someone who literally said, “so it’s just a small convection oven” until we got one. We have used it literally every day since getting it ~2 years ago.
It’s not just any of these things:
- Toaster oven
- Small convection oven
- Small oven
There is so much air moving around in an air fryer that parchment paper without food holding it down gets immediately sucked against the circulating fan filter (which we learned the hard way) and lighter bits of food (like cooked bacon that you might toss in for a quick reheat) will swirl around inside the cook basket.
It may not be for everyone, but it absolutely does cook food faster than in a regular oven, sometimes by an astonishing amount. We have a short but significant list of things that we also think are noticeably better from an air fryer, and nothing I can think of that we’ve tried comes out worse.
What about frozen stuff?
Frozen stuff works great, everything from fries to eggrolls.
You will start to get an idea how long things take after you have it. Many things now have airfryer instructions, or there are lots of “how to make xxx in an airfryer” articles.
Generic airfryer instructions are usually pretty close for ours, but any given model may have its own cookbook with times for different sorts of things (ours does) and after awhile you’ll get a feel for how to nudge generic instructions to fit your model.
For a very small number of specific kinds of breaded things, I’ll spritz them with cooking spray when they go in to help them get more like they were fried in oil, but that’s really personal preference and I only do it on a couple of things.
Get one with a big enough basket. Things need to be cooked in a single layer. You can pack it pretty full, but single layer is important.
Thanks
Most people don’t even know how to use their microwave properly. You really think they know how to use their convection oven properly? It’s not WHAT it does, it’s that an air fryer is usually simple and has shit like “turn dial here to cook a chicken”.
People like it because they don’t know what they’re doing and it does it for them.
And convects much more powerfully and efficiently since it’s shaped like a cylinder instead of a cube and the fan strength to volume ratio is way better.
It is a bit more complicated than that. The WAY it moves the air is different than in a convection oven, so it “fries” a bit better.
This guy does a great breakdown of how it isn’t “just a convection oven”
Just a heads up, the ?si=… part of the youtube url is a tracker linked to you and your youtube history. Youtube will recommend people who click your link other things you watch. The ? and everything afterward can be safely removed and the link will still work.
Same is true for Amazon and other POS websites. Always try slimming your links before sharing with others.
Thanks!
Thanks for sharing this, interesting recipe too, I will try it. The cross section of the air fryer was cool.
deleted by creator
He literally cut one in half and showed how the air flowed and explained why it was different and more akin to deep frying. Maybe watch a video next time before critiquing it.
Tldr, no. To everything you just said.
That was like 10 frames and he didn’t explain shit.
Your a liar and a troll. Fuck off and stop harassing me.
This made my day ty
It is a small fan forced oven. Good for heating up frozen snacks but usually too small to cope with large families and probably not worth bothering if you have a good oven. Since I have a completely shit oven that cooks unevenly, never the right temp, takes ages to heat and heats the whole house up in summer just to make some chicken nuggets for the kids I think they are awesome. If I actually gave a shit about cooking I probably wouldn’t bother. If was single I would probably still rate the toaster oven as the most versatile benchtop appliance (though the biggest fire risk) followed by sandwich press but if you have to heat up manufactured rendered chicken waste shaped like dinosaurs for kids they are surprisingly practical.
Good for heating up frozen snacks but usually too small to cope with large families
What would you recommend for cooking your whole large family?
A family barbeque
If only there wasn’t a repository of human knowledge that could have cleared everything up before this meme was made:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Convection_oven#Air_fryer
And BTW, it’s closer to an impingement oven
Do you expect someone who posts on 4chan to know impingement? Shit I don’t even know what that means
Google Translate tells me it’s “collision” in my language. So we’re talking about CERN-level of tech here, a highly advanced cooking process.
I knew dino nuggies were the God Particle
Impinj makes RFID tags
You mean the Wikipedia article that is literally about convection ovens and has a subheader for air fryers and literally a line where people agree that some convection ovens are better at producing crispier food than air fryers? That smoking barrel of an article?
Man it almost looks like the OOP wrote both.
Air fryers have changed the game. My life is different now. I’m a changed man. I fry my food with the air. I will never go back.
It’s an Adult Easy Bake Oven
It doesn’t take half an hour to pre heat, it doesn’t heat up the whole house, and I’m not sending my power bill through the roof every time I want to make a meal for one person lol
My oven heats up in like 3-5 mins
Lucky you! I’ve never in my life used an oven that took less than 15 minutes to pre heat at the bare minimum
You need to close the door
How do you know it’s hot enough otherwise?? Checkmate
Is it gas? Getting an electric oven to 450 usually takes 15 minutes.
No its electric.
Could be a US low voltage issue? Since im European.
North American ovens run on 240v, they probably just need to replace the heating element
It’s possible he’s running it at 120v if the electrician did a bad job in the kitchen. 400v ovens are fairly common where I live and can run on 240v in a pinch (even if it’s not recommended).
But my EU oven runs on 380V-16A three-phase, because we in the Netherlands and Germany are special snowflakes.
Mines 5 phase. My Dad got because he works at oven.
That’s probably true. Our electric kettles heat up much slower too for the same reason.
The only large appliances that aren’t running 220-240v in the US are the refrigerator and dishwasher .Ovens, washing machines, tumble dryers, furnaces, and water heaters are all on 240 volts.
In Europe, at least my oven is hooked up to 3 phase 400V. That’s more than the 240 max you get in the US.
Serious question, with that much power do you even pre-heat the oven? At that much power, I imagine you can just put the food in and turn it on.
I thought you guys had 240v circuits precisely for this kind of load? On a decent 30a 230v circuit (they generally don’t use anywhere near 30a though) here in Europe it takes considerably less than that. I’d say mine takes 5-8mins for 230c (which is around 450f) and it has a rated power of 3500w.
My Beko oven takes about 25 minutes to preheat to 450. Yes, its 240 volts.
Most of our ovens aren’t hooked up to 240v
Most electric ovens are. 220-240v anyway.
AFAIK almost any appliance labelled/presumed to be 220V in the US is actually 240V unless it was made before the 50s, because we aren’t allowed to have nice things (like accuracy)
Yes. The USA switched our mains voltage from 110/220 to 120/240 about 50 years. There is a tolerance built in (10%) so that if a circuit is actually running at 100 or 220 then its within specs. A 120v circuit can run anywhere from 108 volts to 132 volts and be within spec. Its a pet peeve of mine when people say 110/220.
My oven won’t go higher than 275.
OP is talking about Fahrenheit, but didn’t say so for whatever reason. Most ovens I’ve seen also max out around 275 Celcius.
That’s not even an oven, that’s like… a warm box
275° is enough to 3D print most plastics.
Me omw to eat my 3d printed chicken
It’s a small convection oven. Most ovens are not convection ovens, they’re fan ovens or gas ovens. The biggest downside to both of them is that what you’re mostly heating up is empty space.
I can practically fill my air fryer with enough food for one person. Clearly more efficient.
Also because of the small size it heats up basically instantly, none of this preheating the oven for 45 minutes before you can cook anything.
They also use air that moves a lot faster than a convection oven, which makes a huge difference.
Most ovens are not convection ovens, they’re fan oven
As far as I understand the nomenclature, fan ovens are convection ovens.
following because I also dk the difference here
The difference is between normal ovens with top and bottom heating elements and a fan that moves the air around on one hand and a real convection oven that has a heating element in front of the fan on the other.
Your air fryer likely runs on 120v if you are in the US and your oven runs on 240v. This changes the efficiency equation.
240v lets you pump more amps through smaller gauge wire, but since it’s an air fryer only needs to maintain a certain temperature, 120v is fine, and will not use any additional power over 240v. The amount of total watt hours used is what determines efficiency.
Where 240v is nice is with electric water kettles, where the higher voltage increases your wattage ceiling, letting you dump the energy into the water faster, and thus boiling it faster. A 120v electric kettle would use the same amount of total watt hours to boil the water, but because it’s heating it with a lower wattage output, it just takes longer.
Technology Connections did a good video on the subject.
It’s small and powerful convection oven. I’d still prefer a microwave + oven
Why not a microwave + oven + air fryer?
An air fryer is fantastic for things you’d normally cook in an oven, but it gets them way more crispy without all the oil. You can even “deep fry” by spritzing some oil on top.
If your oven has a convection feature, you can just use that, but it’s also way bigger (read: more energy to cook small portions).
Ok I hear you and offer the far superior, microwave + convection toaster oven (air fryer toaster oven ok just don’t get a bad one)
Toaster oven beats the issue of huge amount of wasted energy and heat and convection is basically 80% of the way to air fryer and also will make general baking faster and more even. So you can use them in place of the oven for lots of things.
Cheap air fryer toaster ovens are often crap though and more just garbage air fryer that opens differently. Don’t buy those.
Any idea if Cuisinart and Ninja air fryers are decent? I’m looking to upgrade to a larger one, and they have ones that look like toasters (Cuisinart and Ninja), but they’re advertised as air fryers.
I don’t really need a toaster since I just toast with my oven (has a “Toast” setting that uses the broiler), and even then that’s pretty rare.
Cuisinart are perfectly awesome toaster ovens and even nice convection but their air frying is mostly just ok. I think their budget options are their best stuff since will work just as well and is as reliable as Cuisinart gets.
Ninja has some kind of secret sauce cause their air frying capabilities in their toaster ovens puts single purpose air fryers to shame. Shockingly good but I am always concerned about longevity since they always seem seconds away from throwing the baby out with the bathwater if they think they have a new device to sell. But these toaster ovens do seem to last. And it’s hard to make them proprietary like other products.
Tl;Dr: if you mostly just care about having a larger more capable air fryer ninja is your answer and they work great. If you want max size the Foodi XL is good and can be got on sale for around the same price as the smaller flip up one but is far more usable as an oven and more.
Edit: I own the new Ninja double oven air toaster oven and love it but I also bought it from a store that sells dented or returned items for half price and it’s my 4th air fryer toaster oven I have ever owned.
Awesome, thanks for the info kind stranger!
I have the Cuisinart model basically right under the tier of the one linked. It doesn’t have a digital display, but it has knobs for controls and timers.
I absolutely love my machine and I’ve had it for about 4-5 years now. It toasts, bakes, and air fries. It does all of those things pretty well. When used to bake, it is so much more efficient than my oven, it is wild. Baking times are lower and the heat up prep time is easily less than half as long if not shorter than the oven, I assume due to the size of the machines.
I would focus on getting an air fryer than can toast and bake as well if you do get one. It fully replaced my toaster, and when reheating food or cooking small batches, I just do not use my oven anymore. Even toasting in it is quick due to the size of the cooking area and location of the pan locations close to the heating elements. It bakes a “take home and bake” style bagel wonderfully, which is now what I’m going to do for breakfast.
I’ve never really found much use for a microwave, but I do too much pastry to be without an oven. And my cakes wouldn’t fit in an air fryer.
I recently acquired my first ‘air fryer’.
Yes, it’s an oversized, convection toaster oven, with a lot of fancy programs built in that I probably don’t need.
Having had a (gas) convection oven in the past, it’s just not the same. It heats up faster, and seems to do a better job of circulating air. Supposedly I had a pretty nice convection oven, too.
I can make really tasty falafel in my ‘air fryer’ that uses a tiny fraction of the oil that is used for deep frying; I wasn’t able to make decent falafel in my convection oven. Does a great job with frozen fries and tater tots too. I need to try roasting brussels sprouts in it, maybe some asparagus.
So far, it’s an easy 9/10. The only downside is the footprint.
It’s a concentrated convection oven. It’s not magic, but I definitely like mine. Great for side dishes like roasted veggies. Also uses wayyyyy less power and time than a full oven when you’re only baking something small enough to fit in an air fryer
I bought mine because it was cheap and didn’t really think i use it all too much. I hardly ever used my oven ever since. It’s nothing special per se, but it uses less energy and everything goes way faster, because you don’t have to heat up a really big box for a piece of bread.
I thought they were dumb for the longest time, but I only have a conventional oven. Some stuff you want a convection oven for. It’s definitely a WAY cheaper alternative than buying a new oven that has both features, that’s for sure. Definitely need to adjust to the difference for temperature and time though, I’ve made that mistake before
Also compared to a full size convection oven, the airflow is much faster and more concentrated in an air fryer, giving not just faster cooking times but a crispier skin effect
Even worse - it is a counter appliance and therefore the path of degeneracy.
I got a larger air fryer that has now replaced my small convection oven, microwave, and toaster. If anything, it’s reduced my counter appliances.
That’s what we have. We found it when our previous microwave finally shit the bed and we got really lucky with the timing and everything; it was on sale and we had the money. It’s awesome! Especially in a very small apartment with barely any counter or cabinet space.
I’m going to have to try replacing my microwave with my air fryer. We mostly use the microwave for reheating food, so I’m worried the fryer will dry things out too much. Any tips?
The other thing we use it for is popcorn, but we eat that almost exclusively in another room, so I could totally just move the microwave there (or get a dedicated air popper).
Mine folds up and is also my toaster oven
Link? My wife wants a bigger one, and I don’t want to use that much space on such a thing. Costco has this one, but it doesn’t fold up.
Are you maybe talking about the Ninja Foodi?
Yeah it’s the foodi. My wife likes the air frying, I love the toaster oven aspect.
Air fryers are basically just small convection ovens. If you have an oven then an air fryer does nothing you can’t already do. That said, it does cook some things slightly faster due to the confined space. I’ve found mine will cook a chicken in just over an hour saving maybe 20 or 30 minutes on a regular oven. I guess it also saves energy / money but whether it ever pays for itself is another question.
Generally it will cook a lot of things better than consumer ovens because consumer ovens are fucking garbage.
But yeah, it’s just a small convection oven that heats faster and more evenly. I love mine. I mostly only use the oven for things that require a solid tray or don’t do well with the fan in close proximity (mostly certain frozen foods). And baking.
Air fryer is just pure convenience. I could cook the chicken in the oven and probably have it come out okay. But, I could cook it in the air fryer, have nice and crunchy skin and save a pan.
I find cleaning the air fryer to be a pain. It’s got the rack at the bottom that I have to scrum, and then the catch pan. If I cook a chicken in my cast iron pan in the oven, I have one flat surface to clean, as opposed to 1 flat surface and one complicated surface. What am I missing?
Also heats up considerably faster than a normal oven. It’s so good for reheating most stuff.
It is waaay faster and easier to use than an oven.
Yeah it is a small oven, but you use it like a microwave.
Throw it in, put on a timer, and in a couple of minutes your thing will be ready.
