Air Fryers - Making 'Fakeaways' and Healthier Family Meals at Home

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For a few months now I’ve been debating getting an air fryer. We’ve recently had a new kitchen extension and FINALLY after living with a postage stamp kitchen for years, we have space we can actually cook in. Counter tops, surface space and a breakfast bar we can eat together as a family. That, coupled with the fact that the cost of living is SOARING, has left us spending more time eating together at home, reducing the number of meals out and takeaways and attempting to reduce the amount of food we waste, something that I think we can all be a bit guilty of.

Air Fryers have grown hugely in popularity over recent years, and it’s fairly easy to see why. Not only can they produce healthier versions of our favourite foods (with far less fat than traditional cooking methods) but they are often cheaper to run, more efficient and big enough to cook for the whole family in one go. What’s not to love?

We recently picked up a Ninja Health Grill and Air Fryer AG551UK from the electricals department at Very and have been putting it through it’s paces over the last few weeks. Could we really really make fakeaways and healthier meals at home that the whole family could enjoy? Let’s find out!

Table of Contents

What are air fryers?

Unlike a traditional oven, air fryers have elements that heat only from above, using large and powerful fans to cook the food and unlike deep fat fryers which cook food in a vat of oil, air fryers don’t require significant amounts of oil to cook your food.

From a busy parent’s perspective, air fryers are ideal fro families as they heat up and cook food incredibly quickly, and most air fryer baskets and grills are quick and easy to clean, with many being suitable to pop in the dishwasher after the food has long since been devoured.

Whilst you can’t go so far as to say all the foods you cook in an air fryer are ‘healthy’, the air frying methods are far better for you than foods cooked via other traditional frying methods.

From a money saving perspective, air fryers are a convenient way to cook and enable you to use up leftovers that may otherwise have been thrown away.

We’re all trying to make our food budgets go further at the moment, so from a quick chicken dish with left over veggies, to my personal favourite chicken fried rice, there are loads of quick and easy dishes that can prevent good food from going to waste.

Our NINJA Foodi Health Grill and Air Fryer AG551UK Experience

There are LOADS of different air fryers on the market, varying fairly substantially in terms of basket size and functionality, but as Mike is partial to a steak or three, the Ninja Foodi Health Grill and Air Fryer ticket a lo.t of boxes. It’s also been voted Best Buy in the Which Best Buy Air Fryers January 2021 – an accolade that speaks volumes about its performance.

Some of the key features of the Ninja Foodi Health Grill and Air Fryer include:

6 unique cooking functions – Grill, Air Fry, Roast, Bake, Dehydrate and Reheat – the latter of which is ideal for reheating my mother in laws epic spaghetti bolognese for my lunch.
Digital Cooking Probe – The Ninja Foodi Health Grill and Air Fryer comes with an innovative leave-in probe that monitors the internal temperature of your food as it cooks – no more stressing about undercooked chicken or over doing your partner’s steak – the Foodi can lets you know when it’s cooked exactly the way you like it. Great for reassurance.
Smart Cook System – simply select a cooking function and food type from a range of preset options using the simple touch screen and then take your pick from rare to well done. The Foodi does the rest!

What I loved about the Ninja Foodi

Neither of us have ever used an air fryer before, but we have both been really impressed at how quick and easy the Ninja Foodi Health Grill and Air Fryer is to use. It can be a bit daunting at first, but after a couple of weeks, there is now no stopping Mike, who has been using the Foodi to serve up everything from a quick reheat, a medley using a random selection of veg, and even nachos, which went down an absolute treat.

Our favourite elements of the air fryer include:

The healthier cooking methods – I am trying to eat more healthily and lose a bit of weight at the moment, so the fact that the Foodi uses up to 75% less fat than traditional frying methods (a claim measured using french fries) is really reassuring. You can cook on the Foodi using no oil at all, or a very small amount depending on your preference, but its nothing like the greasy deep fat fried vat that you may have needed previously to get that crisy on the outside fluffy on the inside finish.
The Foodi is really easy to clean – it has non stick parts which are completely safe to use in the dishwasher, and comes with a cleaning brush to pull away any more stubborn pieces before hand. It came out looking like new each time we washed it to date.
Volume – the size of the Foodi is impressive, and whilst obviously it does take up space on the countertop, you can cook food for the entire family in one go. The grill is big enough to fit up to 6 burgers in one go, so a great way of serving up a quick and easy dinner for the whole family (which I would have struggled with previously with pan space!)
Its fun – this is going to sound weird – but the guided cooking with the Foodi is fun, and feels like you can’t really go wrong. When using the grill it literally tells me when to open up and turn the steaks, and the temperature gauge means i am much more chilled knowing that it will be fully cooked all the way through.

Our Favourite Family Meals and Fakeaways

We’ve cooked a variety of foods in the Ninja Foodi Health Grill and Air Fryer so far, and had no ‘failures’ yet. Mike likes his steak rare, and using the smart cooking system, the steak came out perfectly red in the middle, with the meat being soft and tender whilst still having that chargrilled effect.

Potatoes are also divine in the air fryer, like these spicy spuds that Mike knocked up with our dinner. They were crispy on the outside, but fluffy and soft in the middle. I would’ve quite happily eaten a bowl full!

I have also been really missing our regular Friday night Chinese, but have mastered a mean Chinese style chicken fried rice in the air fryer. If I could only find a way of making the curry sauce to match it I would be on cloud nine (and a lot better off as a result!)

Overall thoughts

Overall we’ve loved how versatile and simple to use the air fryer is – it’s cheaper to run than our oven, which at the moment matters more than normal – I will definitely be using this for the girls midweek dinners rather than turning on our double fan oven.

Having the grill plate, air fryer crisper basket and large main pot make this air fryer suitable for all kind of dinners so we’ve really been enjoying experimenting and trying new ways of cooking. It’s been great for roasting vegetables, chicken, wedges, grilling steaks and chicken breasts.