Where did the recent air fryer trend come from anyway?

Better efficiency but more importantly it heats almost instantly. Thing is like magic. No preheating for 5+ mins.

Plus having a second oven is fucking awesome. I’m out there on thanksgiving with an oven full of turkey, baking dinner rolls on the side like an absolute gangster.

Our oven literally broke (screw you fridgidaire btw) and we made thanksgiving dinner in the air fryer/ toaster oven. Even the turkey! Came out great!
- You bought an oven from a company called 'Frigid Air' and are mad that it broke? What were you expecting?
- Basically this for me but for christmas, the thermometer burnt out or something and caused the oven to turn into a charcoal oven, so we made the rest of the food in the air fryer
I don’t know how to tell you this, but…
Thanksgiving was last week.
- It sucks how immediately after Thanksgiving it's illegal to cook turkey or bake dinner rolls. It's particularly annoying that it's like, a global rule even though Thanksgiving is a US thing.
- You mean two months ago, right?
- Oh shit. Probably too late to thaw the turkey, huh?
- You can make that meal anytime you want!

Where did the recent air fryer trend come from anyway?

Clearly you don't own an air fryer

- So you didn't read the manual at all, huh?
- No but if you’d used breadcrumbs they come out great. It’s not a fryer, but it will elevate any oven-style “fried” food, like oven fried chicken, oven fries, etc. nothing wet, it will just blow it off.
- Yeah it just turns out that convection ovens make great bagged frozen fries.
  I wish my normal oven was a convection oven so I didn't need an air fryer.
- It’s really a mini convection oven.
  Yes but more so. I don’t think there’s any objective criteria but where a convection oven blows hot air over food to brown it all around, sn air fryer blows more to crisp the food
  And for me the convenience is key. Like a microwave, just click a few buttons and wait for it to beep
  My only problem is the lack of recipes. A few processed snack foods have directions, but I’m still figuring out how to vobvert instructions for real food. “subtract 20° and 20% of the time” is inconsistent
- What do you guys talk about?
  *is it this model?

Why is this even a meme? Omg why do can openers exist? 9 inch angle grinders already exist. We had a kids toy lolol

Yeah why does anything exist, we already have rocks and fire

Yeah that's what I said before I got one too.

Air fryers are the shit.

Agreed, it's the best thing I ever bought.
We have a Ninja hybrid type. That thing is AMAZING almost equal to the value of a microwave
- Also got a Ninja one, but we got the thing with dual baskets so you can optionally cook two foods at different temps. Really makes getting those tendies and fries much easier.
I got some $15 one from bestbuy 8 months back I think and it gets used almost every day. I haven't turned on the oven in so long I wonder if it even works...
Biggest disadvantage is that you have another bulky piece of equipment taking up counter space. Best option is to get a convection oven with an air fryer setting. It's even more convenient because it doesn't take up additional space and you don't have to move it in/out of storage. It's always there ready for immediate use.

Ovens are so funny it’s just a fire in tinfoil

When did everyone get too good for sticks and rocks?
- When their huts burned down from leaving the cookies in too long
- I've been throwing food into hot coals. It gives it a crunch.
Cooked food is so funny. It's just raw food but hot.

Air fryers dont heat the entire house 5 degrees. Also they are like 15x faster to make food for 1.

That just sounds like a shitty oven tbh. Modern electric ovens also have strong fans and can potentially draw much more current from a high-voltage outlet.
- That's not great when you're paying for the power
  Air fryers are excellent at cooking up enough food just for 1 or 2 people, ovens are excellent at cooking up a family roast
  There's a good reason they are popular lol, I can have a side of chips ready in 15 minutes flat versus waiting for the oven to heat up then waiting another 15 minutes for my chips to be ready. Plus heating up an entire oven just for 1 serve of chips is just inefficient

Not everyone has a convection oven. They are portable convection ovens, not portable ovens.

I have a toaster oven because I don't need to heat my entire oven and use much more energy and time to heat the entire thing to reheat a slice of pizza.

I use the convection function when I'm working with large amounts but for 1-2 people, the air fryer is much faster.

In my experience they work better than convection ovens. Air fryers can move much more air over the food.
- Air fryers are convection ovens.
Have you tried reheating pizza in a pan with a lid on the stove top?
It's kinda amazing.
I use the convection function when I'm working with large amounts but for 1-2 people, the air fryer is much faster.
In how much of a hurry are you if you can’t wait 4 minutes for the oven to warm up?
- What kind of oven do you have that warms up in 4 minutes?

No, it's not an oven. It's a convection oven, which has existed for decades but never caught on until they were rebranded as air fryers.

It's not just a convection oven, it's a particularly small convection oven. Due to the size, the air blows faster and the heat requires less energy. It's absolutely brilliant for certain applications and it should be recognized as such.
- I will never reheat fries in anything else.
- Yes! People have little patience to know the difference and the effects when they already know it's just an oven.
What? All ovens I've used in my life have been convection ovens.
- And I've never used a convection oven. What a world.
- Generally (in the US) the term convection oven is used to refer to an oven that forces hot air around with a fan, instead of an oven with the radiant heating elements.
  Someone else commented that all ovens are convection and the correct term is "fan forced"... which might be technically correct, but that's just not how the terminology is commonly used at least in the US. Some newer ovens have options clearly labeled "convection" that turn on a fan, sometimes in addition to the radiant heating elements.
  The main reason I think people like convection ovens or air fryers is because the air circulation crisps the outside without overcooking the inside and without all the fatty oils required in a traditional deep fryer.
- Not having a convection fan is pretty much a US-only thing.
Wait. People don't have convection ovens in the US? I think every home over here has been equipped with one since the 1990s or something.
- Yeah they’re not very common in the US unless the kitchen was renovated for a “home chef” type. The average oven you go and just “pick off the shelf” in the US doesn’t have convection. I don’t know anyone with a convection oven, I’ve only seen home cooks/chefs on YouTube with them.
What's really strange to me is that every oven and every toaster oven I've ever owned has a connection setting. So people are buying these huge space-consuming appliances to do something that they can already do with what they have in their house.
- The convection is much stronger than on a regular oven, as someone who has a full sized convection oven, toaster oven with convection, and air fryer.
  Also you would have to use a mesh or rack with a cookie sheet on a lower shelf to expose the bottom of the food to the moving air in your oven without drips sticking.
  If you've tried both, you would see what I mean.
- Not every oven has a convection setting. I'd go so far as to say most rentals don't. Every (electric) oven does have a broil setting. But for some reason you seem to think buying a toaster oven (a small broiler) is fine but an air fryer (a small convection oven) is strange? And an air fryer is "huge"? Are you confused about what an air fryer is? It's like once square foot of countertop space at most.
- Believe me, I thought the exact same thing until we were gifted one, so i get the skepticism! The convection bake setting on my oven is just not even comparable to a $75 air fryer.
  As another commenter posted, air fryers use a much more intense airflow. It's nuts just how much faster and crisper things like chicken thighs and frozen snacks come out compared to the oven.
I'd argue it's better than a convection oven. I think it's the placement of the fan and the higher air flow rate that differentiates the two.
My parents and SO's parents have name-brand convection ovens but they're no where as good as a dedicated air fryer. We've tried the same recipe (potato roasties) across them all and they achieve vastly different results.
- Absolutely. I just bought a new range that does convection oven, and it's not as good as a countertop air fryer.
- This. It's something to do with the fan placement or just the smaller volume of air in the air fryer. I've tried to use a convection oven and it both took way longer and the results were nowhere near as good.
Actually closer to a sub category called impingement ovens.
Wikipedia:
Another form of a convection oven is called an impingement oven. This type of oven is often used to cook pizzas and lightly toast bread in restaurants, but it can also be used for other foods. Impingement ovens have a high flow rate of hot air from both above and below the food. The air flow is directed onto food that usually passes through the oven on a conveyor belt.
- I did not know about them. Thanks for the new information.
A convection oven is a normal oven. "Convection" means it radiates heat and it flows through the oven by convection currents - hot air rises and cold air falls. As opposed to a microwave oven. You probably mean a fan-forced oven - they have been standard in the US since the early 1970s.
- In spite of what the words "convection" and "oven" mean on their own, a "convection oven" refers to an oven with a fan to circulate the air. An air fryer is a small convection oven.
  https://www.allrecipes.com/article/what-is-a-convection-oven/

Even with an expensive convection oven I can't get things to come out as good as they do with an air fryer. The small area through which the warm air circulates is probably the reason. The fan in my air fryer is the same size as the fan in a household oven with convection options, but a much smaller volume of air.

Most people don't actually have convection ovens. Whoever wrote that post probably doesn't even understand that there's a difference between a convection oven and a traditional oven in the first place.

The things that consistently come out better for me in my air fryer (with less cook time) over the traditional oven are:

Home fries Bacon Salmon Chicken thighs Any vegetable Leftover steak Leftover pizza

There are actually very few things I care to use my traditional oven for, it's all just quicker and comes out better in the air fryer. Pretty much anything where you want it to be browned/crispy without overcooking the inside or using a ton of butter will be better in the air fryer.

Because it’s not just a convection oven that’s needed, it’s also venting the moisture that comes off the product being cooked. It also needs to be powerful enough to keep the temperature up while that moist air gets exchanged. That’s a lot easier with a small cavity like an air-fryer than a regular sized oven. Commercial combi-ovens can do the same thing, and maybe there’s some high end consumer models available, but it’s a lot easier on the pocketbook to get an air fryer than a full size oven. I’m not totally sure, but they might also use impingement(concentrated streams of hot air, as opposed to just regular convection), which is another thing that’s available commercially, usually in pizza ovens or things like the merry-chef/turbo-chef(Subway’s sandwich toasters) but not common in consumer equipment.
- Haha yeah it's tasty and effective for sure. I just find it a little too filling when I'm trying to bulk up and eat more protein so I use a Misto sprayer with either olive oil or canola oil. I've had the air fryer set off the smoke alarm a few times when I used butter so I prefer the oils with a higher smoke point.
In the vast majority of convection ovens the heating element is on the bottom. In airfryers the heating element is on top and it circulates the air a lot faster.
They are actually making convection ovens with an airfryer mode now, where it uses a heating element on top and has a more high powered fan.
- The household ovens with convection settings that I've seen had the fan at the back, in addition to the radiant heating element at the bottom, but I definitely found the air fryer to be better.
Tilapia is also great.
I have seriously thought about buying a second air fryer because there are quite a few things that it's completely better for, the problem I run into is trying to do larger meals (5+ people.) You either have to do batches which means more time actually engaged in cooking, or you have to break some things into the oven, and some into the air fryer.

I live alone. I can fit the same amount of stuff I would cook in my oven into my air fryer and cook it better with less electricity and less clean up.

Do you clean your entire oven every time you use it
- No. But when I do it takes forever. Cleaning my air fryer takes a couple of minutes once a week.
- Do you clean your air fryer every time?

They're a trend because they're really good

yeah they're just small convection ovens. Great for heating bread rolls, we use ours more as a toaster than for "frying" (they don't fry)

Yep. Giant superpowered toaster. Useful for ... anything that could do. Which is actually quite a bit.
Best way to reheat pizza for instance. It's nice that they're a little more energy efficient than doing it in the oven, and don't leave it soggy like the microwave.
Not better than stovetop, which is actually best imo, but that takes actual effort.
- I reheat pizza in my air fryer in a moderately involved way (but still low effort). Mine's got a reheat setting, which I set at 200 degrees for like 20 minutes just to get it to slightly above room temperature throughout. Then I hit air broil for maybe 1.5 minutes. It bubbles up the cheese and the oil in the crust without causing anything to char. Tastes pretty great, you just have to be willing to wait 25 minutes.
- I think the pretty good results for not very much effort is why I use mine as much as I do
We make (air) fried chicken with ours, as well as onion rings. It’s super effective.
- Grilled cheese sandwiches are perfection with an air fryer.
- surely they are frozen or pre-fried though, right?
They're a bit more than that.
They're convection ovens where the fan sounds like they're trying to take off and they vent a ton of hot moist air out the back.
If you put broccoli tossed in a bit of oil in an air fryer and a convection oven, it'll come out way crisper in the air fryer.

Cause its so convenient, fast and efficient. I have kids so I can make food quickly (sous vide'd chicken I've done some days earlier, usually) and it doesnt draw electricity as much as my normal oven. I quite like it, and it makes my life easier.

I orginally bought it like 6 years ago to make chicken wings, but nowadays I use it for pretty much everything.

You dont have to like it, thats your prerogative.

it doesnt draw electricity as much as my normal oven.
how do you even know that?
- Because most air fryers are countertop units that plug into a 15 amp outlet, vs most residential electric ovens that require 2x 240v 30 amp connections, or roughly 8x the available power...
- Can't speak for them, but I've had a smart monitor which shows live consumption. Took note of the consumption while using the oven against baseline consumption, and the same for the air fryer.
  Air fryer consumed approximately half the electricity for an equivalent amount of time in my case, but it's made better by the air fryer needing less time to reach temperature and cook whatever it is I'm making.
- I can monitor my power usage via my solar panels and powerwall. The app lets you see how much you're using at any given time, so I just turned on one appliance at a time to test their power consumption.
- Smart meters have been a thing for over a decade now
- This is how I know: https://shop.emporiaenergy.com/products/gen-2-emporia-vue-with-16-sensors-bundle
- My air fryer only draws enough power to spin the fan, all the heat comes from natural gas.

Decent air fryer : $300

Air frying capable oven (lower range) : $600

Good air frying capable oven : $1500+

Pristine, uncluttered countertops: priceless
- I got a toaster oven with a convection oven/air fry option that also folds up so that it takes up less space. The only down side is that you have to be vigilant about cleaning up crumbs, but I like having a motivator. Second favorite appliance, after the dishwasher.
Our ninja ir fryer wasnt that much at all and it does things our convection oven or any other appliance can do.

Air fryers have fans to keep the air circulating. That makes the food cook very differently than a traditional oven. It's more like a convection oven, but with even more airflow.

Also the food is off the floor on a rack or grate while being easy to clean.
Is your oven from the 70s? Even our old oven from the 80s has convection.
- Not sure how that's even relevant. I didn't say anything that even mentioned what kind of oven I have. I was just comparing traditional ovens vs convection ovens vs air frying.

It mostly is though? It's definitely not a fryer. But I agree it still has it's place even next to a convection oven, if not for anything else, then at least for heating the leftovers.
- I guess it's like a phone vs a tablet. They have a lot of similarities and a lot of functionality overlap and you could get by using one in place of the other but their use cases are different. Some people may only have one or the other, others may have both and use each at different times for different things. You wouldn't say someone with a tablet has been fooled into buying a rebranded phone.
- There’s literally no difference between a conventional oven with a fan forced function and an air frier.
  Get yourself a mesh tray for your oven, preheat and you’ve just saved $100+ as well as kitchen storage for yet another gadget.

There is a difference between an air fryer and a convection oven. An air fryer has its heating element in the top with the fan so it is actively blowing hot air down on the food. It's basically a convection broiler.

This right here. A lot of people saying ugh it’s just a convection oven, but they have a weak fan blowing from the back of the oven while the heat source is at the top and bottom, 8-10 inches away from the food. In an air fryer the heat source is only a few inches from the food, and the much more powerful fan is right behind it, blasting the hot air down and through the food. And the small size means no warm up time necessary so it’s far cheaper to run.
- My oven doesn't even run the top element in convection mode.

I think what's more convenient about an air fryer is that it is smaller than a convection oven. It's the next generation of toaster oven.

An air fryer is a small convection oven, but convection ovens aren't particularly common in my experience. It's definitely different than a traditional oven.

Is this an American thing? Because I've never known any house to to not have a convection oven.
- Very American thing. I’ve never seen a convention oven in person.

I've been considering to buy one for some time and recently found a model capable of "air frying", de-hydrate food and a third function I can't remember right now.

For a relatively small footprint, having three machines in one sounds nice.

Dehydrating food is really slow in my experience, but the outcome is definitely worth it.
- I have a dedicated dehydrator with slide in racks. It's faster, uses less energy, and does a better job than the other options.
  Downside is it's another appliance to store and the upfront cost. It does make sense if you do a lot of dehydrating.
- It is and it is.
  I already have one but the machine loses a good deal of heat and the circular trays it uses are horribly expensive, hence my consideration for buying an "air fryer", that is enclosed.
  Have you ever tried dehydrating mushrooms? The flavour kick it gives when adding to soups, stocks or meats... The fruits and vegetables. The flavour gets so concentrated and sharp.
  I need to get my dehydrator working again. Fast.
and a third function I can’t remember right now.
That's the mutate function. Nice if you like your chicken to have gills or your beef jerky to grow feathers.
- Have an upvote for the laugh.
- Can you provide a link?

Just because you don't understand it doesn't mean it's worse https://youtu.be/AASP4P5vRAA?si=aXMjrYK_aRIKX3YR

- I tried, only renting looks barely affordable

I have an oven in my apartment, I use the stove top but I have honestly never once used the oven part. I cook for one so I just simply never make meals large enough to need it, I just make anything that needs ovening in the air fryer. Also don't own a toaster, same deal pop it in the air fryer. It and and instapot are some actual goat level kitchen appliances.

Yeah I really don't get the point my yousemate has one and he insists it cooks certain things better than an oven, but its really just the same and it just seems like a mindless fad people are following that's being pushed to sell useless tat.

Its basically a convection oven with higher air speed. The faster you get heat onto the surface of food the crispier it gets.
frier > industrial convection oven > air frier > convection oven > oven
- Also because it's so tiny you don't have to wait 30 minute for it to hear up
It's a highly efficient small oven.
It's way less volume so it's easier to be consistent I think
My aunt who has been interested in cooking for decades swears they are great. I have yet to do research but I think there's more to it than "smol oven".
- We have a small oven, we bought an air-fryer as an additional oven. Kids love how chips (fries) are crispy on the outside and fluffy on the inside with it. I definitely notice a difference compared to my gas oven. Things cook quicker
I'm guessing it's mostly driven by people renting tiny bedsits where the only cooking facilities they'd normally have room for are a microwave and a kettle. The fad seemed to blow up during the pandemic when everyone's nearby restaurants were shut, so they'd have to live on instant meals and pot noodles. Be a game changer for those folks.
It's probably cheaper to run than a regular fan oven because it's heating less space. Otherwise yeah, it's just a small oven.
- I thought they were for techbros so they could cook their tendies without getting out of their gaming chair.
I think it just depends on what you make. I have one and I find anything that's breaded or fried warms up in that so much better and crispier then the normal oven. Also it usually warms up faster by about half the time sometimes.

This doesn't make any sense.

I have a toaster oven I use for small portions and my oven has an air fryer option.

I totally would have bought into the air frier ecosystem earlier if I'd have known I'd be calling it my wife's easy bake oven.

I have an air fryer but I use its grill more than anything.

Recent? Air fryers have been a thing off and on since the late ‘70s when they used to sell those funny shaped stovetop versions. So that’s 40+ years of air fryer trends.

We got one a few years ago and, while I was highly skeptical about their usefulness, found that it does a fast job of cooking things evenly. I can toss a pork loin in it and it’ll be done in 10 minutes while I’m maybe cutting up some veg for steaming.

are you or aren't you?

Actually got one 2-3 weeks ago and damn, these things are freaking awesome! It doesn't really fry like a deep fryer would but I haven't touched the deep fryer since and I used that thing more than I care to admit.

Yeah, and? I'll take any oven I can get! I've got a toaster oven too! I've seen people with two ovens stacked on top of each other like a washer/dryer combo! Now that's living the dream

I have the stacked ovens! When we moved in, I thought we'd never have a use for it, but it's surprising how often it comes in handy. It's especially helpful around the holidays when there are lots of people prepping stuff in the kitchen at once.
If I could, I'd buy a pizza oven to stack on top of microwave oven.

That's why there are microwaves with a convection oven function.

I have one of these, claims to be a combination Microwave/air fryer/convection oven. I was given a broken air fryer once, and when I took it apart to make it work again, I decided that an air fryer IS a convection oven.

Then why does it taste better? If I bake chicken tenders in an oven, it tastes, well, baked, but if it's cooked in an airfryer, it tastes so much better.

Convection, but like much more than a regular convection oven. If a regular convection oven is a tortoise, the air fryer is a car. It has a much larger fan to push the hot air around the food.
As to why it tastes better, that's because of the maillard reaction. Basically crispy brown bits good and air fryer makes lots of crispy brown bits.
- Me like cripy
Air flow and preheating mostly. Air fryers generally use higher temperatures as well. The big thing is moving Air helps transfer heat more effectively. If you don't preheat an oven you get soggy stuff because it's not hot enough to get the maillard reaction, before the surface gets waterlogged. An air fryer can preheat In a couple minutes, so there's less time to get soggy, and the fab helps a bit too with evaporation.

Ovens have the problem that volume is directly related to the time and energy it takes to bring the temperature up. The oven size isnt designed well for cooking for small number of people, or for snacks.

I dont know why but moving the air around just isnt a standard thing in conventional ovens. It greatly speeds up the heat transfer so things cook faster, and crispier.

And the smaller sizes are nice, I dont typically need 2'x2' cooking space, it ends up being a waste of time and energy preheating these big things.

The lack of good insulation means you end up using similar amounts of energy last I checked.
I have a nice convection toaster oven, which I think is a bit more versatile for the counter space it takes than an air fryer. On convection mode it does a good job moving the air around and I can cook stuff following the air fryer directions, and I don't have to heat up a giant metal box with three racks.
- My parents have had an air-frying capable oven of decades. They also paid a lot, lot more than what the typical air-fryer costs for it.
  Cheap convection ovens do a poor job at moving the heat around, the "pulsated" heat function is mostly a marketing gimmick. Great convection ovens are doing a much better job but they are also five times the price.

Damn, y'all must have a lot of spare counter space.

Ours weighs less than a normal stand mixer, takes up about the same footprint and gets used 10x more often. If we didn't use it all the damn time it would 30 seconds to unplug and put away. Not that big of a deal tbh
Takes up less counter space than a decent microwave and does 3x the work.
- Microwave goes in a cabinet or mounts underneath it. Yes I am an extremist, but I have never seen a counter with an air fryer on it which wasn't a cluttered, anxiety inducing mess.

I'm guessing it came from a college student who wanted to stop using a hotplate for everything.

Low fat is for better health. It’s not exactly a bad trend and you seemed genuinely confused.

I have a convection toaster oven that I have had for years. It is incredibly useful and has enough room to rotisserie a chicken in it, which is much more capacity than any air fryer I have personally come across while not taking up much more room. I highly recommend getting a convection capable toaster oven over anything branded as an air fryer.

Image Transcription: Twitter Post and Replies

alicia, @nerdjpg

Air fryers are so funny cause it's like. That's an oven

alicia, @nerdjpg
They made easy bakes for adults

They've also become popular in the UK recently due to the cost of living crisis there.

You eat dog shit?

They also suggest you use oil when trying to fry things. You just use a lot less oil when you do.

But if you try frying, like, french fries in an air fryer, even with some spray on oil, it doesn't come out the same. It comes out like they were baked. If I wanted them baked, I wouldn't have used a frier.

Yours probably just isn't great. Some you need to let preheat, some just aren't very good. I've always really felt like food comes out of air friers nicely fried, with no oil.
- I have a Ninja. It's not great for frying because they don't actually fry anything. They're convection ovens. It's better for the pressure cooking features than the so-called frying.