Air Fryers and Pressure Cookers - Instant Pots and Beyond

[AbyssStarer]

The trend is spreading, and I've spent much too long eyeballing recipes on Yummly using these.

I first saw Instant Pots last year at my retail job, and ladies went absolute bonkers for them on black friday/around christmas. They were extremely popular for a goddamn clothing store.

Know any good recipes or have an experience using one?

 

[A single cheeto]

I have a Chefman 6.5 air fryer and it's pretty good. Fries come out golden and crispy, and chicken too. Word of advice, if you're thinking of getting one: even though it says air, add maybe a tiny spoonful of oil to it. Makes it better.

As for recipes, I do like Mac n Cheese balls, and Jalapeno poppers.

 

[Dick Pooman]

My brother has one of the basic Instant Pots that I borrowed to make some pulled pork and it turned out beautifully. It seems like you can find decent recipes for anything Instant Pot related with a simple search for what you're looking to make. That's all I did.

 

[XYZpdq]

I've been putting off looking into an air fryer because it'll mean I make a shitload of fries all day erry day.

 

[Recoil]

Air fried food tastes like cardboard (IME).
The whole reason you fry shit in lard is because that makes it taste good.
Fat=Flavor

 

[Chin of Campbell]

My mom makes wicked good stuff in hers when I visit, been thinking of getting one myself since fried food makes me feel so damn greasy.

 

[gobbogobb]

The trick to air frying is you absolutely must add some oil to anything that doesn't have its own oils, like taters. Otherwise you're just gonna have dried out overcooked crispy whatever.

 

[Lackadaisy]

Our air fryer is great for heating up leftovers and frozen food, way better than the microwave. I use it most for pizza and frozen meats.

 

[Love Soze]

I've had a pressure cooker for years and love it. I use it mostly in the fall and winter. Great for soups, roasts, chicken, etc.
I just got a air fryer last year. I was really doubtful about it, but I love it. We use a spray bottle to spray the food in a light coating of oil and it tastes just like a "real" fryer. Everything comes out really crispy. It is great for non-fried food too. It's great for anything you want hot and crispy.

 

[toilet_rainbow]

I mostly use an air fryer for frozen fries because I hate how they taste and feel like when you bake them. I spray a little oil, just enough to coat though. Works like a charm. I've heard of people roasting brussel sprouts in them but haven't tried it yet.

Instant pot I really intend to use but have never got around to. Have definitely seen recipes for them that sounded good, not gonna lie.

My mom mostly uses her crock pot for oatmeal. Make a fuck ton overnight and have breakfast for the next week.

 

[Buster O'Keefe]

Stove top pressure cookers are great for dried pulses and beans: no soaking required. Great at making stock out of chicken carcasses, the pressure pulverises the bones. Any meal which has a high liquid content, you can cook super fast. Also, they're usually huge and you can use them unpressurised for normal simmering. No experience of the Instant Pot take on them though.
Side note: I have heard of some exceptional individuals trying to replicate KFC by deep frying chicken in oil in a domestic pressure cooker. The seals are not rated for that and I can only shudder to think what happens when they fail catastrophically.

 

[NumberingYourState]

Air fryers are an answer to the ecological question of disposing grease properly, since it seems they burn off most of it and leave just enough to barely coat a couple of paper towels. I've seen steaks come out of these things that are just as good from out of an oven paired with searing, so less steps to get a proper cook is always a win in my eyes. The Wolfe Pit did a series with an air fryer and he was a pretty staunch doubter of it for years before taking a shot at it. I may consider picking one up if not only for the sake of my time management.

 

[An Ghost]

Air frier is useful for adding something else easily as a side to a meal. Usually I do diced potatoes with Italian seasoning. Most out there thing was putting holes in canned biscuits and making “donuts.” Tasted good enough.
The worst part about my frier is a crank timer so precision is tough and the temp goes in like 40 degree increments instead of 25 so I have to guess where 350 is between 320 and 360.

I've heard of people roasting brussel sprouts in them but haven't tried it yet.

I quarter, toss with oil and shallots. Come out great.

 

[ProfDongs]

I picked up an Instant Pot since my rice cooker broke and my oven is shit and so far it does the job, for the small types of cooking that I do. I mostly use it for Pulled Pork and Rice and it works pretty well, there are a lot of options and modes on it at the very least if you actually do a variety of cooking. I picked up the middle sized one (I think it goes 6-8-12 quartz) and thats been an ideal size for cooking for myself. I've had it for 2 years now I think and haven't had any issues with it. The only real complaint I have about it is that the steam valve on it feels very flimsy but it does work.

 

[Curious Addie]

All the women of my tribe bought these things a year or two ago when they put out an ad blitz. It's just an expensive pressure cooker with autopilot. I haven't had a meal out of them that didn't taste like baby food. I haven't heard of any of them using it in a long time.

 

[The Vinyl Solution]

Guys just use an oil spray for your air fryer delights like Pam, or your local equivalent. You'll use a fraction of a teaspoon but have a much more even distribution of fat.

Also for you instant pot fanatics here, heres a great recipe:

Some chicken
1 jar of your favorite salsa
Set for 10 minutes on manual
Let pressure release naturally

Now you have tasty chicken you can add to tacos, nachos, etc AND a tasy broth you can use for a soup.

 

[The Shadow]

I have an air fryer. Actually makes cheap frozen potato wedges palatable and takes a lot of hassle out of gatherings. Don't have to watch an oven while I grill burgers or hot dogs.

 

[MAPK phosphatase]

Air fried food tastes like cardboard (IME).
The whole reason you fry shit in lard is because that makes it taste good.
Fat=Flavor

An air fryer is literally a small convection oven that takes up counter space. The name is pure marketing. If you treat it like what it is, a small convection oven, than what it's billed as, something that fries food with air, you'll have better results primarily because of what you mentioned. The oven recipes have you adding lipids to the dish that would be added during frying with frying recipes.

Spoiler: Me sperging

Side note, saying something tastes like cardboard is the laziest critique of food. If it's flavorless say it flavorless. If it's dry say it's dry. If it's tough say it's tough. I have never once seen an actual chef say something tastes like cardboard because they understand food well enough they can pinpoint and articulate what's wrong with it, and even terrible food doesn't really taste like cardboard. "It tastes like cardboard" is just another way to say "it tastes bad" the vast majority of the time.

 

[KE 521]

All the women of my tribe bought these things a year or two ago when they put out an ad blitz. It's just an expensive pressure cooker with autopilot. I haven't had a meal out of them that didn't taste like baby food. I haven't heard of any of them using it in a long time.

Sorry but the women of your tribe can’t cook.

 

[fat ugly sped]

Alright, listen up nerds, I'm about to share the best goddamn instant pot soup recipe. I hardly measure shit, so bear with me. You'll probably want a 6 quart instant pot at least for this.

Start off with four cups of chicken stock (you can use bullion, doesn't matter much, but if you have stock that's great). Add in a bunch of basil, oregano, and maybe parsley too if you feel like it. Herb that shit out. Throw in some salt too. It's really fucking hard to over-season things here.

Then, do you uncultured swine know what mirepoix is? Probably not, but basically it's a 21 ratio of diced onion, carrots, and celery. Just eyeball the amounts and roughly dice an onion, some carrots, and some celery. Throw it into the pot.

Roughly dice 2-3 pounds of potatoes to stick some meat on your bones. Throw it into the pot.

Finally, take 2-3 frozen boneless skinless chicken breasts out of the freezer, and put them in on top. You're not thawing shit because honestly, the entire point of buying an instant pot is so that you can cook without putting up with bullshit like thawing chicken.

Pressure cook the shit out of that on high for like 20 minutes (15 probably also works). Boom, soup. Pretty much the entirety of the work is like 5 minutes of dicing things. Don't bother peeling vegetables unless you're trying to get into a girl's pants or impress her mother or something.