Preheating your air fryer can actually speed up the cooking process and promote even heating. Here's how to preheat your air fryer and when not to.
Everyone knows that preheating your oven is crucial to baking success, but what about an air fryer? "Preheating maximizes both cooking and crisping results," says Purvin Shah, senior vice president of product development at SharkNinja.
Knowing how and when to preheat can be confusing since it differs from model to model. Some of the best air fryers have a preheat setting while others don't, and some recipes call for preheating while others leave the step out altogether. The safest bet is to check the manual since the manufacturer has tested the appliance thoroughly. "You should preheat an air fryer if the user manual instructs you to do so. Preheating only takes a few minutes, so you won't need to plan far ahead," says Shah.
Air fryers are beloved for their ability to crisp up foods while using minimal oil. The gadget uses a built-in fan to push the heat around its interior and the food, cooking it evenly. This allows it to simulate deep-frying and high-heat roasting with minimal oil.
"Preheating circulates super-hot air around the air fryer," says Shah. This means that when you add the food it will start to cook right away and "remove moisture from your food's surface to give it that golden-brown, crispy finish."
Preheating isn't strictly necessary for air frying, and some models don't call for preheating at all. While the following tips are good to use as guidelines, defer to your model's manual.
Before you switch on your air fryer, take a look at the manual for your specific model and find the preheating guidance. Preheat settings, automatic preheat times built into setting the temperature and cook time, and manually preheating all work equally well.
To preheat an air fryer, ensure that all removable parts like the basket are clean and dry and inserted into the unit. Then, either select the preheat setting or program your cook time and allow the unit to automatically preheat. If your air fryer does not automatically preheat, you can preheat it manually. Select the air fry setting and set the temperature called for in your recipe.
"We recommend using a three-minute preheat for most models," says Shah. For larger and oven-style air fryers, preheat for five minutes. Once the preheat timer has elapsed, add the food in a single layer (handling the basket carefully since it will be hot) and cook according to the recipe.
For the crispiest possible food, consider preheating your air fryer. Check your manual to see if preheating is recommended for your model and if your unit has a preheat setting, preheats automatically, or must be done manually using the air fry setting.