During the restrictions imposed as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic, when the gyms were still closed and most people were confined to their homes, I picked up a new hobby: cooking.
I was not alone. Statistics have revealed that sales of cooking appliances, as well as home exercise equipment, surged all across the globe.
Social media platforms were littered with videos of people cooking, baking and working out at home. And among appliances, the air fryer was the choice of many for preparing healthy and delicious dishes. I was certainly one of them. Let me state for the record that the air fryer has been a game changer.
What is the big deal about air fryers, you may ask. Well to begin, let’s get one thing straight, an air fryer is not a deep fryer, it is an excellent and healthy alternative. If you can bake it, if you can grill it, if you can fry it, the air fryer can get the job done in less time and with fewer calories involved.
Research has linked the oils used to deep fry foods to health problems like heart disease, type 2 diabetes, and cancer.
Other methods of food preparation get the job done, but the result is sometimes inadequate. Enter the air fryer, an appliance that promises the taste, texture, and golden-brown colour of oil-fried foods without all the fat and calories.
Air frying is healthier than frying in oil since it cuts calories by 70% to 80% and has a lot less fat.
Using an air fryer will also cut down on some of the other harmful effects of oil frying. The reaction that occurs when you fry potatoes or other starchy foods makes the chemical acrylamide, which research links to greater chances of getting cancer. One study shows that air frying lowers the amount of acrylamide in fried potatoes by 90%.
The air fryer is super versatile and can cook pretty much anything that you would normally fry in oil, such as:
● Chicken, including chicken fingers and nuggets
● Vegetables
● Onion rings and plantain and potato chips
● Cheese sticks
● Fish
● Pizza
● Doughnuts
It is like a mini oven, microwave, an oven, a stove and frying pan all in one.
Some models also have toast and bake settings, making them more like conventional ovens. You can use these to bake brownies or roast chicken. One downside of many of these devices is their small basket size, which leaves little room to cook an entire family meal, although there are bigger models available.
If you haven’t hopped on the air frying train yet, I suggest you should. You can thank me and your health later.
