I'm looking at buying a deep fryer but noticed these "hot air fryers" seem to be all the rage. Does anyone have one and can you vouch for it? Supposedly they use 1 spoonful of oil and hot ail to do the frying.

I'd want to use it for samosas, Bahajis and chips, onion rings, etc. looking for recommendations as to whether they are worth the extra money compared to a normal deep fat fryer.

I've used an Actifry and it does produce good chips - not as good as deep-fried, but better than oven chips. I was surprised at how nice the chips were given the small amount of oil used. Not sure how effective they'd be at bhajis/ samosas etc. If I was you I'd probably opt for a deep fat fryer - you're much more likely to get better, albeit less healthy, results cooking bhajis/samosas/onions rings, in my opinion.

I bought the Philips Airfryer a few month ago. Fantastic piece of kit. Just need to shake the chip a few times during cooking to ensure they cook evenly but the results are great.

That said, i'm struggling to justify my conversion to low fat chips when I put half a gallon of oil in my base... hey ho.

from Jeera:

That said, i'm struggling to justify my conversion to low fat chips when I put half a gallon of oil in my base... hey ho.

If you drink diet coke it balances out the oil in the base ;D

Quote from: natterjak on December 18, 2011, 03:14 PM
I'm looking at buying a deep fryer but noticed these "hot air fryers" seem to be all the rage. Does anyone have one and can you vouch for it? Supposedly they use 1 spoonful of oil and hot ail to do the frying.

I'd want to use it for samosas, Bahajis and chips, onion rings, etc. looking for recommendations as to whether they are worth the extra money compared to a normal deep fat fryer.

Hi Natterjack, I have one and they are really good, I would recomend it

One spoonsful of oil is all you need.

I have had our Actifry for about 3 years it doesnt do chips that well now just seems to break them up, however thick they are, the lid is a pain to keep clean but when we first had it the chips were great better than fried in my opinion havent tried bhajis or samosas so cant say for sure but i think that it wouldnt be very successful the blade turns the food slowly while the hot air circulates round the pan so really bhajis wouldnt be good at all but as for samosas might work. I have made Rogan Josh and a Beef Madras in it and it was excellent very nice indeed also pork chops,  lamb chops, sausages (fresh and frozen) its nice to have because you can just set alarm on the Actifry and get on with other stuff you are cooking . Because we have had it for that long now dont think it heats the food correctly now hence the broken up chips but i would recommend it.

Thanks guys, a few mixed opinions so far.  Those of you who own them seem to like them, but perhaps not the right choice for bhajis.  Hmm, decisions decisions.

I guess what I don't understand is how or even whether an actifry will be any better than cooking chips in a fan oven at 200 deg C with a little oil? Seems like the same thing, except one I can do already and the other requires