Chef warns anyone planning on using an air fryer on Christmas Day will RUIN their feast if they try to cook too much
A MICHELIN-trained chef has issued a warning to anyone thinking of using their air fryer on Christmas Day, saying they could easily ruin the meal.
In recent years, air fryers have taken off in the UK with the kitchen gadget now widely seen in homes up and down the country.
While chef Poppy O’Toole, who has appeared on Channel 4’s Celeb Cooking School, is a fan of ‘air fried’ meals she has shared her experience about how things could go horribly wrong.
One reason air fryers have become so popular lately is that they can save on a family’s energy bill compared to a conventional oven as the cost of living continues to hit.
Poppy admitted that she will be “definitely” using hers on the big day as she “needs all the space for everything”.
As everyone knows, space in the oven is at a premium as chef’s try to squeeze everything in so it is all ready on time.
With that in mind, Poppy intends to make full use of her air fryer.
She said: “There’s not enough space to do everything, but what it’s really good at is giving you the capability to do more stuff at the same time.”
Poppy added: “So you’re not just relying on the oven and the hob – you’ve also got this other piece of equipment, which is amazing at cooking things and it can be done quicker and more energy efficiently”.
However, she did raise a note of caution, saying it’s easy to ruin the Christmas dinner if you use an air fryer.
While it might seem obvious, Poppy said to make sure the timer is on.
She warned: “I’ve done that a few times, where I’ve gone, it comes out in 20 minutes or whatever and you go, ‘yeah, I’ll come back in a few minutes, it’ll be fine’.
“And I’ve left it in there the whole time and it’s burned to a crisp”.
Poppy also warned not to overfill your air fryer, even if you are pushed for time.
She said: “It can be very easy to throw it all in, ‘it’ll be fine’. But it doesn’t work that way – the whole point is that the air circulation gets around everything, so it needs a gap where that can happen.”
Before you even think of starting to cook with your air fryer she also advised giving it a proper clean before putting it to work on Christmas Day.
Poppy said: “I don’t wash it enough, I don’t clean it enough.
“I end up getting these little dark bits on the rest of my food, which is fine when you’re cooking for yourself – that doesn’t matter.
“But when you’re cooking for other people, if you’ve got family coming over, you want to make sure it’s the best.
“So make sure in between each thing you cook, you give it a little wipe down.”
Meanwhile, a cook has shared how she cooks tasty cheesy pigs in blankets in her air fryer.