Pinch of Nom’s Favourite Air Fryer Accessories
There’s not long to wait now until our brand-new cookbook Pinch of Nom: Air Fryer is out there in the world! While we wait for it to hit the shelves on June 20th, there’s no better time to organise your kitchen, and stock up on essential air fryer accessories.
You can pre-order Air Fryer right here.
With the right kit, you can make just about any kind of recipe work in an air fryer! Whether you’re looking to crisp up some chicken or bake a fluffy, light cake, there’s usually a way to make it possible.
To help you get started, we’ve pulled together a list of all our favourite air fryer accessories, and dropped in some recipe inspiration along the way.
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The best air fryer accessories for everyday cooking
Even if you’re not planning on making anything too fancy in your air fryer, there are lots of bits and bobs out there that can make it easier to cook in your device.
If you want to make the most of the space in your air fryer’s drawer or basket, you might find a set of air fryer racks come in handy. By creating an extra shelf, you can fit more into your air fryer, without overcrowding it.
This Air Fryer Rack Set of 4 will do the job nicely, raising food up so you can cook two things at once, or double the portion. Air can still circulate round the air fryer drawer, so everything will crisp up perfectly.
We’d use them to make a bumper batch of Air Fryer Rustic Potato Wedges. It’s important to make sure they’re all laid out in an even layer so every chunky chip can get crispy on the outside, and fluffy in the middle.
The beauty of an air fryer is that it gives you a deep-fried crunch, without the need to use lots of high-calorie cooking oil. A few spritzes of a low-calorie cooking spray is all it takes to guarantee crispiness.
It’s important to remember that you should spray the food, rather than your air fryer tray or basket. It can be tricky to remove any residue if it gets baked on!
A few spritzes of low-calorie cooking spray helps the cheesy coating stick to our Air Fryer Crispy Green Beans. This recipe is so quick and easy – and the crunchy veggies go with everything!
Because air fryers are so powerful, they don’t lose heat as much when you open them to check on food. Unlike cooking in an oven, you won’t have to worry every time you need to shake the basket, or flip food over to ensure even cooking.
A pair of silicone tongs will come in handy time and time again when you’re cooking everyday meals. One of the least expensive air fryer accessories, we’d choose silicone ones over metal tongs to protect the non-stick coating of your trays or baskets.
These Air Fryer Sticky Chicken Nuggets need turning over halfway through the cooking time, to make sure both sides of every nugg get gloriously crispy! We can’t get enough of the sticky-sweet sauce on these (can you believe they’re just 212 calories per serving?!).
Speaking of silicone air fryer accessories, it’s well worth picking up a couple of silicone basting brushes. Ideal for adding all kinds of glazes and sticky sauces to whatever you’re cooking, they’re heat-resistant and so much easier to clean than fibre bristles.
We’ve marinated our chicken in aromatic ginger, a hint of chill, zesty orange and zingy lime for these Air Fryer Ginger and Orange Chicken Kebabs. You can leave them to soak up the flavour overnight, but there’s no reason you can’t baste them with a little leftover marinade towards the end of the cooking time for an extra boost!
If you have a small kitchen and a bulky air fryer, we can’t recommend picking up some appliance sliders enough! Another cheap accessory for your air fryer, these small adhesive sliders stick to the bottom of your gadget, and they make it super easy to move around your counter.
Great for protecting your surfaces too, they’re really handy if you keep your appliances tucked away in a corner until you need them.
The best air fryer accessories for mess-free cooking
We all know the worst thing about your air fryer is having to clean it! The good news is we have a whole article dedicated to cleaning tips, so you can get it sparkling like new in no time.
If you’re looking for air fryer accessories to make the whole process easier, you can always stock up on disposable paper liners. They’re usually available in packs of 100, to keep you going for a bit!
Just remember not to put them in your air fryer while it’s preheating – you need to add the food to weigh them down first, so they don’t catch on the heating element.
These Air Fryer Cauliflower Hot Wings are exactly the type of recipe that you’ll want to cook using a liner. The breadcrumbs and glaze add so much lip-smacking flavour (but they can be messy to clean up afterwards!).
We’d rather pay once and use something time and time again, which is why we love our silicone air fryer liners. Easy to wash and reuse, there are lots of different shapes and sizes available, so you shouldn’t have to search long to find some that fit your model of air fryer.
We’ve even included them in this video on our Instagram channel!
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We’ve heard people say their food doesn’t crisp up as well in a silicone liner, but we’ve found that if you choose ones with grooves on the bottom, the hot air should be able to circulate. As long as you shake or flip the food, it’ll still get lovely and crispy.
Use them to rustle up our Air Fryer Pesto Roast Potatoes and you won’t have to worry about scrubbing pesto off your baskets!
The best air fryer accessories for baking
One of the questions we get asked the most about Pinch of Nom: Air Fryer is are there sweet recipes inside? The answer is yes! We love baking in an air fryer, and there’s no reason to struggle if you have the right equipment.
To start with, we’d recommend grabbing a small loaf tin. This Chef Aid Non-stick Mini Loaf Tin is great for individual-sized treats, although you could measure your air fryer basket and get a bigger one if it’ll fit.
Why not try making mini versions of our Banana Bread with Chocolate Chips recipe? It’ll cook a lot faster in an air fryer, so you’ll need to keep a close eye on it, and check our air fryer conversion guide before you crack on.
Whether it’s muffins, cupcakes or Yorkshire puds on the menu, you can bake up a storm with these Selecto Bake 6 Cup Silicone Bun/Muffin Mould Cupcake Trays on hand. Make sure you measure up your air fryer first, to check the trays will fit in.
For smaller air fryer models, you might want to pick up individual silicone cupcake moulds instead!
Once you’ve seen how crispy our Lighter Yorkshire Puddings get when you cook them in the air fryer, you may never make them in the oven again…
We also love making all kinds of puddings in ramekins. A set of these Ramekins for Air Fryer will come in useful for sweet and savoury recipes alike.
They’re ideal for cooking small portions of tinned beans, tomatoes or even eggs! We’ve portioned some of the sides up in foil to make our Air Fryer Full English, but these ramekins will work a treat – plus they can be washed and reused after brekkie too!
What are your favourite air fryer accessories?
We’d love to know if you think we’ve missed anything good off our list! Pop on over to our Facebook group to let us know what bits and bobs make cooking in your air fryer easier. Even if you just want to be nosy, there are always handy tips and tricks being shared in the group by our lovely PON community!
And, if you need more air fryer recipe inspiration, why not browse through some of our other articles?