Air Fryer! HELP!

We thought we were being sooo kewl by giving each household an air fryer for Christmas, since we're all so health conscious. The plan was to demonstrate ours on Christmas day, by cooking healthy appetizers, then bringing out the gift-wrapped boxes for the other families. Today, I opened our box and started reading. YIKES! The only thing that makes these recipes "healthy" is the lack of oil. Everything is breaded, potato-based, cheesy, or otherwise NOT healthy. These puppies were our big presents for this year and we do NOT want to take them back and start over. Anybody out there have one of these and do something healthy with it? I'm gonna check the appetizers thread and see if there's anything there we can use. This is a real disappointment, and even though we got "such a deal" these babies were still expensive.

Don't have one, but found this:
http://emerils.com/129097/air-fried-zucchini-yellow-squash-and-carrots
There are "similar recipes" at the bottom which also feature vegetables.

Also:
http://potluck.ohmyveggies.com/guilt-free-airfryer-vegetables-fries/
http://www.jenniepperson.com/veggie-cheats/

BeetlesPerSqFt wrote:Don't have one, but found this:
http://emerils.com/129097/air-fried-zucchini-yellow-squash-and-carrots
There are "similar recipes" at the bottom which also feature vegetables.

Also:
http://potluck.ohmyveggies.com/guilt-free-airfryer-vegetables-fries/
http://www.jenniepperson.com/veggie-cheats/

Wonderful! Thanks, Beetles.  I also found cauliflower balls and fried chicken. We will make some special dipping sauces and use skinless, boneless white meat to make small chicken bites, seasoned, but not battered. I'm really excited about this.

OMIGOSH! This air fryer is AWESOME! It's a must-have for every sfger who cooks. I never can harvest enough of anything at one time to make a whole meal, but just one squash or a handful of beans is all I need to make a healthy, scrumptious appetizer. 

First up was the trombincino squash. I sliced it about 1/4" thick, left the skin on (mistake), coated it with a tiny bit of olive oil, seasoned it with a little sea salt, and "fried" it for about 25 minutes (pulling out the tray and shaking it twice during cooking). They were beyond delicious!


Next came a squash I thought was zucchini, but it was firm and seedless?? Anyway, one of the sites I found for tromboncino said it's good with basil, so I decided to throw a few whole leaves and stems in with the squash slices. When I took them out, I planned to throw the basil into the compost, but when I pulled out one of the leaves, I decided to taste it, just for grins. WOW! The air fried basil was better than the squash (which was awesome, by the way). We ate up that plate of goodies so fast I forgot to take a pic of it.   Anyway, I just had to share this awesome kitchen experience. Now I'm going to cook the chicken tenders that were supposed to be the main event, but are now relegated to boring afterthought status.

Great testimony! What brand and model?

sanderson wrote:Great testimony!  What brand and model?

Yes, I have heard of them but no real life testimonials.

Scorpio Rising wrote:

sanderson wrote:Great testimony!  What brand and model?

Yes, I have heard of them but no real life testimonials.

Mrs TD wants one of those air fryers so I am interested also in brand and model.

trolleydriver wrote:

Scorpio Rising wrote:

sanderson wrote:Great testimony!  What brand and model?

Yes, I have heard of them but no real life testimonials.

Mrs TD wants one of those air fryers so I am interested also in brand and model.

This one is a Kalorik "Smart Fryer with hot air technology". There's no model # on it that I could find and no capacity specs either, but it basically holds about 2 lbs or less at a time. The instructions are a little vague. I had to get Hubby involved, cuz I couldn't figure out how to get into it, but you basically just pull the handle. 

There's not a single recipe for anything healthy, so you definitely need the Internet. Emeril has some good stuff. 

I think the regular price is over $100, but we got ours for less than $50 with Black Friday discounts.

The unit is kinda heavy to move around, but the 2 baskets that need to be cleaned are light-weight and non-stick. Easy Peasy! I quit making kale chips because of the mess using cookie sheets and the oven. I can't wait to try them in this puppy. 

The "fried chicken" turned out great. Hubby gave me his secret seasoning recipe (celery salt, rosemary, & sage). I marinated the pieces in a little olive oil, seasoned with his herb mix, then popped them into the cooker. They came out perfect, with no mess.

You need non-metal utensils or be very careful not to scratch the cooking basket. I was afraid food would stick to it and need to be scrubbed or soaked off, but so far that didn't happen. I know that non-stick cookware doesn't stay that way for long, even with careful use, so I suppose we might have problems down the road, but for now I couldn't be happier.

We have a cooks essentials 1400 watt 

Basically it's a 3 quart convection oven.  Main advantage over our convection oven is it's small size, integrated air flow basket and easy clean up.

It makes oven fries and pretty much anything else you'd what to "oven fry"

Main drawback is small size and need to keep things in a shallow layer. If you get veggies in a couple layers you'll need to regularly open and shake or move the contents to get even cooking.

No_Such_Reality wrote: If you get veggies in a couple layers you'll need to regularly open and shake or move the contents to get even cooking.

Yup, I open and shake everything at least a couple of times.

Didn't know what an air fryer is / was so I Googled them    , ha ha a hot air machine that heats up very lightly  oiled food till it browns & is coked . better than heavily oiled or fat soaked stuff I suppose .

 I wonder if it works withe zero calorie spray stuff?

 I also found an Amazon hand book for them at :-

Healthy Air Fryer Cookbook: TOP 55 Air Fryer Recipes with Low Salt, Low Fat and Less Oil (Air Fryer Cookbook, Air Fryer Recipes book, Air Fryer Books, Air Fryer Recipes Cookbook, #AirFryerbook)

9 May 2017
by Adele Baker

 We have opted to give our daughter  a halogen light( source of heat )  cooker with internal fan that will do the same but it will also take a 3 pound chicken & side veg so she can cook her meals in the communal kitchen when she is at Bristol  veterinary university  in student accommodation .

plantoid wrote: I wonder if it works withe zero calorie spray stuff?

My book says yes, but that's for spraying the bottom of the basket to keep stuff from sticking. I still think the food needs olive oil, but I've only been at this for one day, so I'm not exactly an expert.

countrynaturals wrote:

plantoid wrote: I wonder if it works withe zero calorie spray stuff?

My book says yes, but that's for spraying the bottom of the basket to keep stuff from sticking. I still think the food needs olive oil, but I've only been at this for one day, so I'm not exactly an expert.

Yes it does those zero calorie non stick sprays are just oil in a can with additives to help it spray. They're zero calories because of the serving size which is 1/4 of a second.  Yes 1/4 of a second. The resulting zeros are all due to rounding. 

We use a Misto sprayer with olive oil for many veggies. I find the air fryer needs a little heavier spray to crisp and carmelize instead of burn and brown.

Look what Santa left at the TD house ... a Philips air fryer.

Sweet!

trolleydriver wrote:Look what Santa left at the TD house ... a Philips air fryer.

Nice! Please share your favorite recipes. I can't wait to try kale chips.

Wow...

Today is Munchkins 16 th birthday . One of the dozen or more presents we gave her is a Salter Aero cooker ... so glad I saw this thread . It's a halogen infra red heat generator with a circulation fan ,, timer & thermostat

 The hand book does not cover much but gives a clue for the basics . I went onto you tube ...found no end off similar cookers , found out a tremendous amount of useful info as well as a lot of rubbish .  .

There may be an easy way of steam cooking veg & opened eggs in lidded glass jars if you don't want them but poached instead oiled , experiment & experience is the watch word .

Happy new year

Dave & family

plantoid wrote:Today is Munchkins 16 th birthday . One of the dozen or more presents we gave her is a Salter Aero cooker ... so glad I saw this thread . It's a halogen infra red heat generator with a circulation fan ,, timer & thermostat

 The hand book does not cover much but gives a clue for the basics . I went onto you tube ...found no end off similar cookers , found out a tremendous amount of useful info as well as a lot of rubbish .  .

There may be an easy way of steam cooking veg & opened eggs in lidded glass jars if you don't want them but poached instead oiled , experiment & experience is the watch word .

Happy new year

Dave & family

Nice! Looks like a lot of us will be experimenting with delicious, healthy cooking in 2018. I guess we just found our New Year's Resolution.

Air fryers were patented in 2013 so it is very new technology being used .
 Most cook books won't yet have loads of foodies coloured pictures in them .

 We got a book from Amazon , after reading comments on all manner of such books available .. having read it cover to cover I think this is the best to currently be had .
  
It is :-

Air Fryer Cook Book by Jolene Daisy   ISBN Code  9781979137454


It has 101 recipes in it , each recipe gives very easy to follow instructions , tells you how how long it takes , how many calories  & how many servings it makes .

Each recipe has a black & white picture , but really they are not needed . I suspect that they are in black & white to keep costs down

 I reckon that if you stick with it and do all the recipes in the book it won't be long before you are using the cooker in a very competent manner ,able to turn out all manner of cooked dished , soups , puddings &  veggie stuff.


 One thing to think about getting for the air cooker is a digital meat thermometer on a lead wire so you can check the internal temps of an occasional thick joint of meat etc to see if it is cooked properly dep inside . 
Like all good ANSFG'ers  write down the results of each cooking session , as the old neck top computer memory bank is very unreliable in such matters .

When Munchkin goes off to university with her Air Fryer Cooker in  2020 . I think we will be getting our very own Air fryer as it can easily handle the smaller portions.

Thank you for the review of the book. It has an affordable price, also. Neck-top computer - love it!

We have been cooking some of our SFG grown Canada Crookneck squash in our new Philips Air Fryer. The squash really tastes sweet and delicious. We still have a couple of Crooknecks left in storage. Need to grow more this year. Again I have to thank sanderson for encouraging me to grow this wonderful winter squash.  Can't wait to get the megatrellis back in action for a second season.

(This post is also on the Fourth Year SFG in Canada thread).

We also have a Philips. Kids love churos and and chicken wings using this air fryer.

suseine wrote:We also have a Philips. Kids love churos and and chicken wings using this air fryer.

Son's MIL just sent over some more zucchini. Gotta make time to do something with the zukes in the air fryer.