I made baked potatoes in the air fryer and oven – 1 was crispier and fluffier
To see which method reigns superior, I cooked a baked potato in the oven and one in the air fryer - the winner surprised me.
I love a perfectly baked potato. It’s such a comforting side dish, and if you top it with something like baked beans and cheese or tuna and mayo, then it can be a main course, too. Ideally, you want a fluffy middle and a nicely seasoned, crispy outer skin. But there are a lot of cooking methods out there that won't yield these results.
In an effort to find the best way to cook a baked potato, I tried two different methods using an air fryer and an oven. For each one, I used a cleaned baking potato roughly around the same size, oil, and sea salt. Before putting each of the potatoes in those two appliances, I put them both in the microwave first, as this is what I always do when cooking jacket potatoes. I find the microwave speeds up the cooking times and results in a fluffier inside.
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While some people are fine with just using a microwave to cook a jacket potato, this appliance will never give you that crispy skin you get from baking it.
Oven
After cleaning, poking holes with a fork and coating the potato in oil and sea salt, I placed it on a plate in my 900W microwave for exactly six minutes.
Those using a smaller potato or those who have a microwave with a different wattage will need to alter their timings.
I then carefully transferred the potato to a baking tin and put it in a preheated oven at 200C Fan.
After 40 minutes in the oven, the potato was ready, and the skin looked perfectly crispy.
Cutting it open with a knife, I noticed that it came out relatively fluffy on the inside, but I found it a little too dry in some places and not cooked properly in others.
Air fryer
With the second potato all prepped, I again cooked it first in the microwave before transferring it to the air fryer basket. I cooked the potato in the air fryer for 20 minutes at 200C.
After 20 minutes, the skin was crispy, and the potato looked even more crispy than the one baked in the oven.
When I cut it open, I was shocked at how evenly cooked it was. The potato was easy to fluff, and the skin had a great texture and flavour.
Out of the two methods, the air fryer was the clear winner for texture, taste and time. It was evenly cooked, fluffy on the inside and crispy on the outside, which gave the potato a better shape. The crispness of the skin also made it ideal for stuffing with hearty toppings.
