Infrared Air Fryer

[ElsieD]

Yesterday I took delivery of my new air fryer, the TFal Infrared.  Apparently infrared is new technology in the world of air fryers; I haven't heard of any others.  It replaces my Instant Vortex Plus which stopped working.  As you can see, it has a smaller footprint and is much lighter than my old one.  It also has a smaller basket  than my old one.  My 1/8 sheet pans, which fit the Instant, do not fit the new one.  It has three features which I didn't have with the Instant.  First, it has a toast setting and since it is lunch time here, I'm looking forward to see what kind of toast it makes.  Secondly, it has a crispy finish feature.  Using this, the fryer automatically adds 2 minutes @450F on the broil setting to the cooking time.  Finally, there is a depression in the basket that holds 1 ounce of water, which they say might be useful when cooking, say, vegetables where the moisture would be beneficial.  Last night I cooked up some plain chicken wings using the broil setting for 15 minutes and crispy finish.  They were great.  This morning  I baked a couple of mini scones, and that worked just fine.  Off to make some BLTs and try the toast function.

[rotuts]

it the size difference of the basket ' significant ' 

 

other than not taking the 1/8 sheet pan ?

 

is the ' see-through ' feature , on the basket front useful ?

 

thank you for posting.

[ElsieD]

4 hours ago, rotuts said:

it the size difference of the basket ' significant ' 

 

other than not taking the 1/8 sheet pan ?

 

is the ' see-through ' feature , on the basket front useful ?

 

thank you for posting.

The inside basket dimensions in inches in my TFal is 8.5 x 7.5 x 5.25 versus the Instant which was   9 x 9 x 4 so the size difference is not insignificant.  It'll take getting used to.  I had the "see through" feature on my Instant and found it useful for monitoring what little I've tried so far.  I'll appreciate it on the TFal as well.

 

I tried toast today.  If I were TFal, I wouldn't brag too much about this feature.  At 2 minutes it had barely started to turn colour.  At 6 minutes, it was dark in spots, pale in others.  I do believe I'll stick with the toaster.

 

Attached is a picture of the Tfal basket showing the well in which you can put an ounce of water, if desired.

 

 

 

 

Edited September 12 by ElsieD (log)

[Kerry Beal]

I unpacked it at work this am - but didn't put it through its paces. When would you add water? Couldn't see that on first glance on the instructions. (ok - have read back now and see the answer is there)

Edited September 12 by Kerry Beal (log)

[ElsieD]

I'll be curious to hear how your toast turns out using that function.

[mgaretz]

I don't think infrared air (oil-less) fryers are new at all.  As I recall, the very first attempts at this were the round, glass-bottomed contraptions that used infrared heating (often from a halogen source).  You can still find new versions of them out there.  (I also seem to recall the very first attempts used a paddle to move the food around the circle.)

[palo]

Actually, I rather liked them - high temp - large capacity - easy to see how things are cooking

Major downfalls were having to wash that huge heavy glass bowl and where to put that hot lid when you take it off

 

https://www.amazon.ca/gp/product/B007P6SAZ4/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&th=1

 

p

[ElsieD]

3 hours ago, palo said:

Actually, I rather liked them - high temp - large capacity - easy to see how things are cooking

Major downfalls were having to wash that huge heavy glass bowl and where to put that hot lid when you take it off

 

https://www.amazon.ca/gp/product/B007P6SAZ4/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&th=1

 

p

Do you still use it?

[palo]

No, the cleaning and what to do with the hot lid were deal breakers.

 

I now have the Instant Vortex Plus XL 8-quart Dual Basket Air Fryer Oven - dual baskets individually controlled also cook sync (if one basket is set to 350 for 10 minutes and the other to 400 for 15 minutes, you can sync them so they bboth finish at the same time)

 

https://www.amazon.ca/gp/product/B09K6MK5VN/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1

 

p

[rotuts]

I first became aware of the dual-basket interaction 

 

from a cooking show by Jamie Oliver . using a dual basket AF

 

from and sponsored by T-fal.  two episodes .

 

now you either like JO , or you dont .  no matter

 

at first I did roll my eyes a bit .  mostly as I already had a fine AF.

 

But I can see the D-AF  for that situation , where you do some selection of ingredients

 

prep  etc  with your food , then dont really want to spend attention

 

for a stove top . or a large oven .  and you even get too ' dump ' the 

 

***  delicious ****  ( ed.:  that is possible , but its  up to you ) on to plates.

 

so , not for everybody , very interesting .

Edited September 13 by rotuts (log)

[ElsieD]

I had read somewhere that if using both baskets, the power gets split between the two.  I have no idea if that is true.

[rotuts]

@ElsieD

 

the total watts or energy the device can get from the outlet 

 

has to be split up , in some way 

 

its possible as the two containers are smaller , the coil that converts the watts to your food

 

might be smaller , and thus each smaller units gets enough to do the job over all;.

 

just a guess .   but Im user its technically a bit if not more for each basket.