(upbeat music)
- If you've been shopping for small appliances recently
for your kitchen, you probably have seen air fryers around.
They're relatively recent,
but really popular.
(upbeat music)
- An air fryer has a basket in here that comes out,
sort of like a fryer basket,
but it's sitting in this bucket here
and then it has preset settings here.
You can set the temperature or the time.
Basically, it's a fan that blows hot air
around the oven cavity,
so it's sitting above a heating element
and it's circulating the air all around the oven cavity.
Despite what their name would imply,
air fryers are just mini convection ovens.
- Just a convection oven. - Just a convection oven.
- Just much smaller.
- Just much, much smaller, yeah.
- Okay.
So if it's just a convection oven,
why are air fryers so popular right now?
- A lot of celebrity chefs have endorsed them,
so they've become very popular.
They have a very strong marketing campaign.
We've been seeing them everywhere.
They're advertised as a more healthful alternative
to deep frying, but since it's actually convection baking,
not deep frying, these companies
are sort of comparing apples to oranges, right?
It's two different cooking processes.
So when you're traditionally deep frying,
you'll get that really crispy exterior
because the food is coming in direct contact
with the oil, which dehydrates its surface
and makes it really crispy.
This doesn't do that.
You're baking versus frying.
- So what you're telling me is
baking french fries in here on the convection setting
is the same thing as cooking your fries in here?
- Absolutely.
- Why not just call it convection?
- Well that is a great question.
People don't realize what convection actually does.
The term air frying is a more,
it's easily digestable, right?
Like, people can kind of imagine what that means
and use it.
And we're actually starting to see
that a lot of companies are calling the convection setting
on the oven at your home or in a toaster oven,
they're just calling it the air fry setting.
For that reason, it's become a buzz word
that people know and want.
- So, all of these things do convection baking.
- Right.
- What's so great about convection baking?
- Well, convection baking sort of speeds up the process
and it's also less prone to hot spots in the oven
because the fan is circulating the heat around the food.
- You tested a few of these. - Mhmm.
- What did you find, like what were your experiences?
- One of the biggest takeaways from testing
was that since the capacity is so small in these,
you just can't cook as much food--
- Right.
- As you can in a convection toaster oven.
If you were to fill it to capacity,
you would not be able to cook everything evenly.
It's so cramped in there
that the air can't circulate around the food.
You end up having to do things in, like,
little layers, basically,
but then you're not making that much food at once.
So if you're trying to feed a family,
it's very challenging to get food on the table quickly.
(upbeat music)
Overall, they don't cook as well
as just a regular convection toaster oven.
- Do things get crispy in here--
- They do-- - Compared to this?
- I mean-- - This is hot.
I keep touching it.
(laughing)
- It's on!
(laughing)
It does get crispy on the bottom and like, on the top,
where the air is surrounding the food--
- Okay.
- But a lot of times, if you overfill the, you know,
the basket in here, it will be soggy in the center
and so, one of the issues with these
is that you can't fill them to capacity, right?
You have to do sort of an even layer on the bottom
to make sure that everything gets crispy,
but then you're only making about two servings of food
at a time or less.
- Like, let's just talk about the food.
I mean, 'cause that's really--
- Right.
- Like what this is about, right?
We have plates of fish sticks.
- What I saw the most in testing
was just that the direct contact with the food on the pan
will give you better browning.
- Right.
- Whereas, if it's all cramped in this little basket
and the air is trying to circulate the whole thing,
you're gonna get really nice pieces,
but then you're also gonna get some really pale pieces.
- Mhmm.
- And it's just sort of all mixed
and some are, like, soggy on one side
'cause it just can't reach the full capacity
of what's in there.
The same with the fish sticks, you know,
we're getting, like, nice browning on and consistently
for all the food in the convection toaster oven
compared to this one.
(upbeat music)
This model is $250, which is the higher end
of the air fryers.
Like, they range in price so they,
I think the least expensive one we tested
was maybe $50 or $60,
but those models did not cook very evenly.
This model is $160
and you can cook more food in it
and, in general, it cooked better than this,
which is $100 more.
- What can you do in here that you--
- Well, like, in here, you can bake a pie in there
if you wanted to--
- Right.
- It makes a beautiful pie.
And this even comes with a pizza stone
and that's another thing about the accessories of these.
You can buy other accessories like a pizza pan
or a cake pan and there's racks that you can buy
to like, layer the food in there.
But again, it's just, like, more stuff
for this little appliance.
They're all sold separately,
so that's not, that price, $250,
doesn't include any of the extra--
- Right. - Accessories.
You can use all of the cake pans and sheet pans
you have at home in a regular toaster oven
and you don't need to go out and buy any more things
if you wanna use this, right?
This, in the long run, we think, will serve you better.
- When you were roasting those chickens
in both of these simultaneously,
I noticed that this one is very quiet--
- Right. - Like an oven
and this one is very loud--
- Yeah. - Like a turbine engine.
- Yes. (laughs)
This sort of annoying humming sound,
(laughter)
the whole time that it's operating, so,
that's also something new about these.
- What about non-stick coating?
- The non-stick coating on the inside of this,
you know, it's, well, right now it's kind of gross
because it's oil, but it's eventually gonna wear down
if you don't wash it by hand.
You should really try to wash it by hand
even though the manufacturer, most manufacturers, say
that you can wash it with a dishwasher, but--
- You can't wash non-stick coatings in a dish,
I mean you can, but it's gonna wear it down.
- Yeah.
- It just, it's a fact of life.
You gotta wash it by hand.
And like--
- You gotta be careful with the,
with metal utensils too.
- You gotta wash that by hand, folks.
- Yeah.
And this.
- And that.
(laughing)
- Whereas, in this, it's just a pan that you take out,
you can throw it in the dishwasher.
So, it actually ends up being a little bit more work
than I think a lot of people expect.
(upbeat music)
- So, they're still very popular.
I mean, they're not in stores for nothing.
So like-- - Right.
- What does it do right?
- Well, it does cook faster than a convection toaster oven
'cause of the smaller capacity,
but you just can't cook that much food at once.
But yes, it is faster, so that's a--
- How much faster?
- We're talking like a few minutes faster.
I mean, it sort of depends on what you're cooking,
but-- - A few minutes?
- It's a few minutes.
So you're not shaving off that much time.
I think one of the most important things to know
is that air frying is just convection baking.
It's the same thing.
There's no difference there. - Not frying.
- It's not actually frying.
- Not frying. - Yeah.
We're not saying that air fryers don't work as they should.
- Mhmm.
- It's just, if you're coming to this
and you're trying to decide,
should I get a convection toaster oven
or should I get an air fryer,
well then you should definitely
get the convection toaster oven
'cause it can just do so much more.
You don't have to buy any other, you know,
accessories to go with it
and it just cooks more food at once
and overall, it did a better job cooking.
- And it makes toast.
It looks like, yes, it also reminds me of a small egg.
Like a small, tiny egg. (laughs)
- Tiny, dark egg. - We digress.