The golden promises of the air fryer were just too tempting to ignore.

Browned and crisp French fries, craggy chicken wings coated in hot sauce, breaded calamari that crunches audibly when you bite down — all without the unctuous mess, wafting odor and calorie count of deep-frying. Home cooks celebrated the appliance not just for its faux-frying capabilities, but also for its ability to cook small amounts of food (potato wedges, broccoli spears, chicken) much faster than their regular ovens.

Could air fryers really be the best kitchen innovation since my beloved electric pressure cooker, or is it all just too good to be true?

After extensive testing, my colleagues at Wirecutter, a product review site owned by the New York Times Co., panned the appliance as overhyped and overpriced. The Kitchn, a home-cooking website, firmly agreed with that assessment, while Cooking Light magazine reported uneven results.

The only way I’d find out if an air fryer was worth my precious counter space would be to try it for myself.

If it sounds too good to be true, well, maybe it is.

Air fryers have been one of the fastest- growing items in the category of small home appliances since they were introduced in Europe in 2010. According to Joe Dero­chowski, home-industry adviser at the NPD Group, a market research firm, nearly 10 million air fryers were sold in the United States from late May 2017 to mid-March 2019. He likened their growth to that of multicookers like the Instant Pot, of which about 13 million were sold in the same time period. And growth is accelerating over the past 12 months: Air fryer sales increased 69 percent, year over year, in 2018.

These numbers account only for stand-alone air fryers, and not countertop convection ovens with air-frying functions, like the Breville Smart Oven and the Cuisinart AirFryer Toaster Oven.

For my own testing, I chose a small (2.75-quart) free-standing model by Philips, the one recommended by Wire- cut­ter, which wouldn’t require as much valuable counter space as some of the other models.

HOW IT WORKS

An air fryer is basically a shrunken countertop convection oven. Some models are egg-shaped, with a footprint similar to that of a coffee maker. Others resemble large toaster ovens, boasting a bevy of functions — roast, convection bake, toast, dehydrate, proof — in addition to air frying.

Like convection ovens, every model is equipped with high-speed fans to circulate hot air around your food. But air fryers blow air more forcefully and at hotter temperatures than regular convection, in an attempt to mimic the browning of deep-frying, using teaspoons of oil rather than cups.

THE RECIPE TESTS

I wanted to determine what the machine did best, not everything it was capable of, so I nixed the entire category of baking recipes. I also skipped frozen prepared products like French fries, breaded fish sticks and chicken nuggets: I stuck to foods I wanted to eat.

That definitely does, however, include French fries made from fresh potatoes. I’ll happily devour a plate of extra-crisp, darkly browned fries as my dinner, along with a salad. Deep-frying French fries in the standard way is particularly messy, though, because you need to fry them at least twice for maximum crispness.

After air frying nearly a dozen batches, I found that cooking them in stages at two different temperatures (350 degrees, then 400) yielded a solid A-minus batch of fries: not as good as deep-fried, but better than my oven- baked fries, and easy enough for a Tuesday at home.

Next, I moved on to chicken wings, turning to Ben Mims’ cookbook “Air Fry Every Day” (Clarkson Potter, 2018) for guidance. Using a trick he picked up from the website Serious Eats, Mims coats the chicken skin with baking powder, which expands in the heat and causes the skin to bubble up and turn supremely crisp, he explained.

It worked perfectly, yielding ultra-crunchy, golden wings. I also made the same wings in my regular oven using the convection setting, and they were almost as crisp-skinned, although they took longer.

Neither version was as good as regular, deep-fried wings, but they were good enough to get devoured in minutes.

“People think they can just replace their FryDaddys with air fryers and get healthier versions of the fatty food they love,” Mims said, referring to the countertop deep fryer. “But air-fried chicken is never going to taste as good as oil-fried.”

Agreed.

The Southern-fried chicken legs I made in the air fryer were some of the worst of my experiments — burned yet soggy and thoroughly rubbery. Slightly more successful but still not worth eating were breaded shrimp and calamari, doughnuts and jalapeno poppers, all of which cooked unevenly and failed to brown and crisp to a satisfying degree. Pizza was also a bust.

VEGGIE SUCCESS

So I asked Mims, what were the best things I could make in my air fryer?

“Vegetables!” he said. “Especially the soggy ones.

“The air fryer fan wicks away excess moisture, almost dehydrating food, so it’s really great for notoriously soggy vegetables like zucchini, summer squash, eggplant and okra,” he said. “The pieces get dried and crunchy on the outside and tender within.”

I tried tossing veggies with a tiny bit of oil and air-frying until the pieces were burnished and tender-crisp. They were all a bit better than if I’d run them under my broiler, and far easier and less messy than frying.

The air fryer also did a very good job cooking small amounts of food, like a couple of salmon fillets, which look and taste as if you’d roasted them, but get there more quickly and evenly than in a regular oven. This is in part because of the hot air flow from convection, and in part because the small chamber of the machine doesn’t require much, if any, preheating.

For many households, this speediness is even more important than being able to cook with far less fat.

“People come to air fryers thinking they’re going to do fried chicken, chicken wings and french fries all the time, but then they end up using them more for weeknight meals,” said Dean Brindle, vice president of category strategy and product development at De’Longhi NA, a home-appliance manufacturer based in Italy, which unveiled its version of the air fryer in 2015.

“There’s been an evolution in what consumers want,” he said, “there are the slow-cooker dump recipes, the sheet-pan recipes, and now those same folks are turning to air fryers for speed and convenience.”

THE TAKEAWAY

If you’re in the market for a tiny, speedy countertop oven, you’ll probably be happy. But I already have a big oven that I don’t mind using on a daily basis. And while the air fryer was brilliant with some vegetables, the results from my broiler were very close.

What was even worse was that all that air-fried food only made me crave real fried food, aggravating the itch rather than scratching it.

With just a little sadness, I gave my air fryer to a friend, who uses it to make meatballs and sweet potatoes for her 5-year-old.

And I’m glad to have my countertop back, which leaves me plenty of room to wield my sheet pans without knocking into my Instant Pot.

AIR-FRYING TIPS

>> Don’t crowd: If you stuff the air fryer basket or rack, your food will steam rather than crisp. For a smaller model, this could mean cooking food in many, many batches, so if you cooking for more than two, consider a larger model.

>> Don’t overcook: The fan may dry things out, turning ingredients from crisp to hard and leathery.

>> Use dry breading: This works much better than a wet batter, so use flour, egg and breadcrumbs, in that order, and press down on the crumbs to help ensure the breading sticks. (Air fryer fans are very powerful, and if an ingredient is not well-coated, the breading could fly right off.)

>> Add a little oil: Unless a food is inherently fatty (such as bacon, skin-on chicken or a batch of meatballs), always add at least a little oil, which encourages browning. Otherwise, the fan could dry out the food.

>> Prevent smoking: If you’re cooking really greasy food like bacon, put a tablespoon of water or a piece of bread on the bottom of the air fryer to catch grease.

>> Give it a shake: Turn your food or shake the basket to ensure even cooking.

AIR-FRYER FRENCH FRIES

By Melissa Clark

• 1 large russet potato (about 8 ounces), cut into 1/4-inch-thick sticks
• 1-1/2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil, divided
• 1-1/2 teaspoons kosher salt, or more as needed
• >> Dipping sauce:
• 1/4 cup mayonnaise
• 2 tablespoons sour cream or plain whole-milk Greek yogurt
• 1 tablespoon Dijon mustard
• 1/4 teaspoon smoked paprika

Put potatoes in bowl and cover with cold water. Soak at least 30 minutes (or up to overnight, refrigerated), then drain and pat very dry.

Heat the air fryer to 350 degrees, if preheating is necessary. Line a rimmed baking sheet with paper towels.

In a dry bowl, toss potatoes with 1 tablespoon oil and salt. Transfer to air fryer and fry at 350 degrees for 10 minutes, tossing halfway. Transfer the potatoes to the baking sheet, spreading them in an even layer, and let cool to room temperature, at least 30 minutes and up to 4 hours. (This step is optional; it makes the fries slightly crispier. If you want to skip it, keep the potatoes in the fryer and proceed to the next step.)

Turn the air fryer heat up to 400 degrees. Arrange potatoes in the fryer if you’ve taken them out, and drizzle with remaining 1/2 tablespoon oil. Cook until golden and crisp, about 8 to 10 minutes, tossing or stirring halfway through. Transfer immediately to a serving platter and sprinkle with more salt. Serves 2.

While the fries are cooking, make the sauce: In a small bowl, stir together mayonnaise, sour cream, mustard and paprika. Serve alongside the fries for dipping.

Nutritional information unavailable.

SPICY CHICKEN WINGS

By Melissa Clark

• 1-1/4 pounds chicken wings, cut in half through the joint into wingettes and drumettes
• 1-1/4 teaspoons baking powder
• 3/4 teaspoon kosher salt
• 1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper
• 1 tablespoon melted unsalted butter
• 1 teaspoon finely grated lemon zest
• 1 teaspoon fresh lemon juice
• 1/2 teaspoon honey, preferably dark
• 1/2 teaspoon Tabasco sauce
• 1/4 teaspoon Sriracha or other Asian chili sauce

In a large bowl, toss chicken with baking powder, salt and pepper until the pieces are thoroughly coated. Spread the pieces out on a rack placed on a rimmed baking sheet and refrigerate, uncovered, for at least 1 hour and up to overnight. (The longer, the better.)

Heat the air fryer to 400 degrees, if preheating is necessary.

Arrange chicken on air fryer rack so all of the pieces are standing up against the edges of the basket, with as much space around each one as possible. Fry until golden brown and crispy, about 20 minutes.

Meanwhile, in a large bowl, whisk together butter, lemon zest and juice, honey, Tabasco and Sriracha.

Immediately transfer the fried chicken wings to the bowl and toss well. Serve at once. Serves 3 to 4.

Nutritional information unavailable.

BRUSSELS SPROUTS WITH GARLIC, BALSAMIC AND SOY

By Melissa Clark

• 1 pound Brussels sprouts, trimmed and halved through the stems (cut larger ones in quarters)
• 3 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil,
• divided
• 1/4 teaspoon kosher salt
• 2 garlic cloves, thinly sliced
• 1/4 cup balsamic vinegar
• 1 teaspoon fresh lime juice, plus more for serving
• 1/2 teaspoon soy sauce

Heat air fryer to 400 degrees, if preheating is necessary.

Place Brussels sprouts in the air fryer basket; drizzle with 1 tablespoon oil and the salt. Fry for 15 minutes, shaking basket or stirring the sprouts halfway through.

Sprinkle sprouts with garlic. Continue to fry until the garlic is golden brown, another 2 to 4 minutes.

Meanwhile, in a small saucepan, bring balsamic vinegar to a simmer. Continue to simmer until thickened and starting to look syrupy, adjusting heat as necessary to prevent burning, 2 to 3 minutes. (Keep a close eye on it; it will go from reduced to burned very quickly.) Remove from heat and whisk in remaining 2 tablespoons oil, the lime juice and soy sauce.

Transfer Brussels sprouts to a serving platter and drizzle with balsamic dressing. Squeeze more lime juice on top to taste. Serves 3 to 4.

Nutritional information unavailable.

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