The air fryer has transformed from being a novelty appliance to a weeknight workhorse across the UK, promising speed, thrift and a punchy hit of crispness. Speaking to Express.co.uk in an exclusive interview, MOB Kitchen recipe writer and food producer Jodie Nixon set out the three star turns every air fryer owner should master in the basket, including “shatteringly crisp” roast potatoes. Though dubious of air fryers at first, Jodie says they are “a very good way to free up space and for convenience”, and has gone on to author MOB’s first air fryer book edition, ‘Delicious Air Fryer by Mob: 100 easy, healthy, tasty recipes’.
Start with those roasties, said Jodie, who swears by the air fryer’s compact, intensely circulating heat for achieving “really delicious, shatteringly crisp roast potatoes”. Given that an air fryer is essentially a small fan oven, it circulates very efficiently, giving you “such crispiness on things”. The practical payoff is twofold: you get golden crusts and audible crunch while freeing the main oven for a meaty joint and trays of veg.
Crispy chicken thighs are Jodie’s other weeknight marvel. She calls skin-on thighs “incredible in the air fryer”, explaining that a simple pre-salting step sucks out some of the moisture and obviously seasons the chicken.
Her advice? Dry thoroughly, then lay them skin-side down to begin; in a fryer, “the heat’s really circulating around, and so it really immediately crisps up the skin”, she says.
Flip to finish and you will, in her words, “get the crispiest chicken skin” without the faff of frying or the waiting time of a conventional oven.
Then there are the eggs. Many of us avoid poaching at home, but MOB Kitchen’s resident air fryer expert insists the air fryer opens the door to reliable results. “You can fry an egg, or you can boil an egg, or you can poach an egg,” she says, adding that even sceptics will be surprised.
Her poached eggs take just five minutes and feature in the new MOB cookbook too. “Cook poached eggs for five minutes at 200C in a little ramekin with boiling water, no vinegar….perfect”, said Jodie.
For something more surprising, Jodie names aubergine katsu as a personal favourite from the new MOB Kitchen Air Fryer Cookbook. She describes it as “the crispiest aubergine” with a centre that is “perfectly soft in the middle” — never undercooked like aubergine often is.
Paired with steamed rice, a simple katsu-style sauce and crunchy bits for contrast, it shows, as she says, that “just because you’re air-frying something doesn’t mean that it has to be boring”. In fact, the MOB approach keeps recipes “really nutritionally balanced”.
Jodie admits that she was “very, very, very dubious” about air fryers before MOB asked her to create an eight-recipe series. “Then I did these recipes and I was like, oh my God, my life is changed,” she says — and the ideas kept coming.
She drafted over 100 recipes, and “there are still so many things that you can do that are not in this book”, which is why she believes air fryers are “only ever going to be a good thing” for helping people eat better at home.
You do not need a premium kit to get premium results. Jodie uses a basic one-drawer, two-dial model — “about 80 quid from Argos” — and has also tested the fancy versions.
Her practical hacks are pleasingly old-school: treat the drawer “like a pan” and wash it every time, and consider a reusable silicone liner – but choose wisely as some brands leave an odd taste.
Jodie warned against putting tin foil in an empty, running drawer because it can blow into the heating element.