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Vince Glielmi uses an air fryer to cook some zucchini at his home in Lancaster on Monday, May 9, 2022. His wife Lynn sits in the foreground.

Vince Glielmi uses an air fryer to cook some zucchini at his home in Lancaster on Monday, May 9, 2022. His wife Lynn sits in the foreground.

When I was assigned to write a story about air fryers, my initial reaction was skepticism. Air fryers are a kitchen appliance fad, right? I mean, how many of you are still using your George Foreman grills? Your spiralizers? Your instant pots, pasta makers, juicers, bullet blenders, or panini presses?

There is no denying that air fryers are having a moment. According to the NPD Group, a national market research firm, over 25 million air fryers were sold in the U.S. in 2021 and 2020, a 76% increase over the prior two years.

But air fryers carry a whiff of deception, or a least extremely savvy marketing, because they do not fry. Air fryers are simply countertop convection ovens, which is an oven with a fan inside. They blow very hot air around your food without a whisper of frying going on in there.

To research this fraught topic, I needed to hear from someone who loved their air fryer and from someone who did not. Vince and Lynn Glielmi represent the duality of air fryer attitudes – he loves it, she won’t use it. Read on to find out why.

Vince is a 78-year-old retiree with lots of activities to keep him out of trouble: golfing, dog walking, piano lessons and spending time with grandkids. But until recently, Vince had never cooked in his life.

Cooking was the province of women; first his mother and then his wife, Lynn, who made every family meal during their 51 years of marriage. After all that time in the kitchen, Lynn wanted Vince to share the responsibility for cooking during his retirement. Lynn signed Vince up for cooking lessons but the only result was a single inedible dish of pretzel-covered chicken.

Vince said, “My wife was threatening to withhold favors if I didn’t learn to cook; I was getting desperate.”

Then, one Sunday morning about six months ago, Vince sat down to watch Emeril Lagasse on TV. Emeril was using a magical device called an air fryer and Vince was instantly hooked: “This is the perfect answer”, he thought, “I can do this!” He picked up the phone and placed his order.

The next thing Lynn knew, there was an R2D2-sized appliance squatting on her kitchen counter. “There was no room for anything else” Lynn said, “I told him to send it right back.” After Vince cooked two dry, leathery chicken breasts in the new air fryer, he sadly boxed it up and returned it.

Vince, however, kept watching Emeril.

“This man” said Vince, “makes cooking with an air fryer so exciting.”

Emeril demonstrated a new air fryer model that was only the size of a toaster oven. With relentless optimism, Vince ordered the small air fryer without consulting Lynn.

This has proven to be a life-changing decision for both of them.

Using cookbooks by Emeril and Elena Baker, Vince has blossomed into an air fryer chef. He has cooked rotisserie chicken, chicken wings, ribs, steak roulade and chicken piccata.

“I just found out where our spice drawer is!” he says.

According to Lynn, the meals Vince makes in the small air fryer are astonishingly good. Vince and Lynn now take turns cooking two nights per week.

And yet, Lynn does not use the air fryer.

“Why would I use that?” says Lynn. “It’s just a gadget; the oven works fine for me. But hey, if it gets him cooking, I’m all for it.” Lynn’s decades of culinary expertise mean that she simply has no need for the latest shiny new thing.

So what is the appeal of the air fryer for Vince? Partly, it’s that he doesn’t feel like he is competing with Lynn at kitchen skills where she is already the expert. The air fryer is new, and he is its master.

Also, the air fryer comes with detailed instructions. “The oven is overwhelming to someone who has never cooked” Vince says, “The air fryer tells me exactly what to do.”

But the biggest part of the appeal of the air fryer is the promise of healthy frying, an oxymoron if there ever was one. And yet, an air fryer doesn’t fry anything. It is simply a countertop convection oven - an oven with a fan in it.

Because healthy frying was such a big part of the appeal, learning that his air fryer was just a convection oven shocked Vince.

“You’re kidding” he said, shaking his head in disbelief, “I’m crushed.”

Is cooking in an air fryer healthful?

But even if he isn’t doing “healthy frying”, Vince is still cooking in a healthful way.

According to UPMC’s Health Beat, cooking in an air fryer is better for your health than frying because less oil is absorbed by the food. UPMC suggests using the air fryer to cook healthful ingredients, like avocado fries instead of French fries and cauliflower buffalo bites instead of chicken wings.

What’s in your air fryer?

LNP|LancasterOnline sent an email survey to readers to ask about their air fryer usage. The results may surprise you:

The moral of the story? The air fryer may be a fad, it may be an oven masquerading as a fryer, but for one retired Lancaster County couple it’s been a game changer. And, if Vince can cook, anyone can cook.

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