New discovery about air fryer can change your mind

Scientists have compared the cooking method using an air fryer with traditional methods such as stir-frying, frying, boiling. and came to a surprising conclusion.

Recently, researchers from the University of Birmingham (UK) and the Max Planck Institute for Chemistry (Germany) compared cooking methods to assess the concerns about causing air pollution in the kitchen.

To do this, they set up a kitchen in the lab, and looked at different methods used to cook chicken breasts. The methods included: pan-frying, deep-frying, stir-frying, boiling, and using an air fryer.

The findings give homemakers another reason to believe in air fryers (Photo: Getty).

Using machines that measure the concentration of particulate matter (PM), volatile organic compounds (VOCs), and chemical pollutants present in food, scientists discovered something surprising: air frying is the least polluting method.

Specifically, for PM, measurements taken in micrograms per cubic meter (μg/m ³ ) showed peak levels of 92.9 μg/m ³ for pan-frying, 26.7 μg/m ³ for stir-frying, 7.7 μg/m ³ for deep-frying, 0.7 μg/m 3 for boiling, and just 0.6 μg/m ³ for frying in an air fryer. This result is 150 times lower than pan-frying.

For VOCs, measurements are given in parts per billion, with the highest recorded readings being 260 for pan frying, 230 for deep frying, 110 for stir-frying, 30 for boiling, and 20 for air frying.

Thus, frying chicken in a pan on the stove will emit an average of 13 times more volatile compounds than an air fryer.

The findings give homemakers another reason to trust air fryers: they reduce indoor air pollutants, which have been linked to health problems like respiratory infections, heart failure, and dementia.

Researchers emphasize that in addition to the cooking method used, it is important to keep the kitchen ventilated during and after food preparation , regardless of the cooking method.