Stop crowding the basket and your food will actually get crispy

I keep seeing photos in this group where people pack the air fryer basket to the top like a Thanksgiving turkey pan. I ran a side by side test last week with 12 chicken wings, 6 per batch. The batch with space between each wing came out crispy in 18 minutes at 400. The crowded batch took 26 minutes and still had soggy skin on half of them. The manual for my unit literally says to cook in single layers, but folks seem to think it's a mini convection oven. If you want that restaurant crunch, give the air room to move. Has anyone else noticed this or do you just double your cook time and deal with it?

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davis.dakota10d ago

Flip the wings halfway through too, not just leave them sitting there. I learned the hard way that crowding makes the top layer steam while the bottom layer barely cooks, so I do batches of 8 max in my 5 quart basket. Also patting the wings dry with paper towels before seasoning makes a bigger difference than people think, wet skin steams no matter how much space you give it. Once I stopped treating it like a full oven and started doing smaller batches, everything got way better. The extra time is worth it when you bite into an actually crunchy wing instead of chewy skin.