I’m renowned amongst my friends for showing up fashionably late to a party. You’ll find me entering a gathering one hour after kick-off with a face full of glam, bottle in hand and good mood on tap.
The fashionably late approach is a principle I like to apply to life, and trends in general. I joined Instagram’s answer to Twitter (sorry – ‘X’) ‘Threads’ a few days after its launch, making me member number 13,123,797. I missed the first series of Love Island UK but by the second, I had my eggs in one basket. I didn’t attempt a Peloton lesson in the spring of 2020, but by lockdown number two, I was hooked.
Why am I telling you this? Because I’m ashamed to admit I have clocked on to the culinary trend for air fryers so late, it can no longer be considered fashionable. But here I am about to tell you why following a few weeks of air fryer ownership, I’m convinced this was and is worth the hype.
The UK’s leading electrical retailer AO.com sent the Ninja Foodi Max Dual Zone AF451UK Air Fryer in Black to us to trial, which is one of the best-sellers in their early Black Friday sales (reduced from £249 to £219). This deceptively compact model boasts a generous 9.5kg capacity, two baskets for cooking different food at the same time and the ability to sync the baskets to finish cooking simultaneously.
Here are five reasons why investing in an air fryer will revolutionise your mealtimes:
1) Speed:
After a long day at work, an air fryer will become your secret weapon in the kitchen, making it possible to cook a satiating meal in minutes. With less space to heat up, air fryers typically save around 30 minutes of cooking time in comparison to a conventional oven. We’re obsessed with the Ninja Foodi Max Dual Zone Air Fryer’s ‘max crisp’ setting which turns frozen oven chips into crisp-as-you-like fries in around 12 speedy minutes.
2) Space-saving:
Air fryers are more compact than you might think and can fit neatly on kitchen worktops. The Ninja Foodi Max Dual Zone Air Fryer also has multiple functions and can be used to alternate between baking, roasting and grilling, eliminating the need for a standalone grill or other kitchen gadgets. This model even allows you to sync the drawers so that each drawer finishes cooking at the same time.
3) Energy efficient:
You don’t need us to tell you how expensive winter fuel bills can be! As air fryers speed up the cooking process they will also save precious pennies on your monthly energy bills. Heat your whole oven on a Sunday for a roast when you’re using all shelves and default to your air fryer for the rest of the week.
4) Healthier option:
Before I trialled the Ninja Foodi model I didn’t believe that air fryers could replicate the flavour and satiating crispiness of deep-fried treats. But I’m happy to have been proved wrong. Air fryers use a mist of high-temperature oils to cook meals quickly, whilst demanding far less oil than an average frying pan or deep-fat fryer. In fact, when cooking chips in ours, we didn’t add any oil, instead utilising the maximum crisp setting for a perfectly crunchy outer.
5) Easy to clean:
Air fryers are an absolute dream to wash up; simply rinse out the draws and hot plates between uses. We also invested in some handy reusable air fryer liners that can be washed separately for even greater ease. Not only are they low maintenance to clean, air fryers also create less mess than frying on a conventional stove top making those icky oil splatters a thing of the past.
To get your hands on the Ninja Foodi Air Fryer and other brilliant Black Friday deals, visit: www.ao.com
