Can you put paper towels inside an air fryer? There are quite few reasons for which you would want to put a paper towel inside your brand new air fryer. Maybe you want to soak up the leftover grease during the cooking process, or you simply want to ensure easier cleanup after you’re done air frying your delicious meal. Either way, using regular paper towels in an air fryer isn’t exactly the best idea. There are however equally good and efficient alternatives! Let’s take a closer look at the matter.
- Why can’t you use paper towels in an air fryer?
- What can you use instead of paper towels?
- Reasons why you might want to put baking paper inside your air fryer
- Is putting parchment paper in an air fryer safe?
- What temperatures can baking paper withstand?
- The conclusion – baking paper in an air fryer
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Why can’t you use paper towels in an air fryer?
The reason why you cannot use paper towels in your air fryer is actually the same as the reason why you wouldn’t want to put paper towels in a regular oven. Paper towels in high temperatures will simply burn, cause a safety hazard and mess up your food and kitchen appliance.
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Temperatures in air fryers can reach up to 400°F / 200°C, while in regular ovens they can often reach up and above 450°F. This can cause regular paper towel to combust. This is why you shouldn’t put any kind of non-oven grade paper in your oven or in your air fryer.
What can you use instead of paper towels?
Instead of regular paper towels which are unsuitable for air fryer use, you can use baking parchment paper which you can get for as low as a few dollars for a roll.
Baking paper no only used for baking, but also for preparing greasy food in an oven and ensuring it does not stick and is easy to remove after the cooking process is finished. Incidentally, baking parchment can also easily be used in an air fryer after you take some precautions.
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As regular baking parchment paper is safe to use inside an oven and safe to use in temperatures up to 450°F / 230°C, it can be a perfect match with your air fryer.
You can safely use baking paper inside your air fryer for as long as you don’t cover your air fryer’s internal air vents, and don’t let the paper touch the heating elements inside your air fryer.
If you do restrict the internal air flow by covering the fan or air escape routes your food might not get cooked evenly.
Reasons why you might want to put baking paper inside your air fryer
As we’ve mentioned, there are a few reasons why you’d want to put baking parchment inside your air fryer. The most common of these are:
- Keeping the food from sticking to the air fryer basket’s surface.
- Keeping the individual pieces of food separated inside the basket.
- Ensuring easier cleanup when preparing more greasy foods.
If for whatever reason you’d like to put baking paper or parchment paper inside your air fryer you have to keep a few other things in mind, read on!
Is putting parchment paper in an air fryer safe?
So, can you safely put parchment paper inside an air fryer? The short answer is: yes, as long as your chosen parchment paper is designed and branded as a “cooking paper” or “baking paper” and adhere to a few basic rules.
The rule of thumb is: if you wouldn’t put it in an oven, don’t put it inside your air fryer! Don’t use butter paper or waxed paper. Only parchment paper designed for baking is safe to put inside an air fryer.
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Although traditional baking parchment is safe to put inside an air fryer, you should remember not to cover any internal air vents inside your appliance when putting it in.
Air fryers are built with undisrupted internal air flow in mind, so make sure that the parchment paper you’ve put in doesn’t obstruct any of the internal vents – otherwise your food might not cook properly.
To sum it up, to safely use parchment paper inside your air fryer you should:
- Double check if your baking paper isn’t in fact waxed paper or butter paper.
- Make sure that the parchment doesn’t cover the fan, vents, or otherwise restrict the internal air flow.
- Don’t let the parchment paper touch the heating elements inside the air fryer.
If you’ve done all this you should be good to go!
What temperatures can baking paper withstand?
In general, there is no risk of combustion when using parchment paper inside your air fryer. The internal temperatures of an air fryer – usually up to 400°F / 200°C are also below the maximum 450° F that’s traditionally found on the higher end of the regular kitchen oven scale, and the baking parchment is designed to withstand these quite easily.
Baking parchment paper is in most cases able to withstand temperatures up to around 450°F / 230°C.
Even if the baking parchment blackens during the cooking process, by design it shouldn’t release any noxious or toxic chemicals.
Remember though, that this applies only to baking parchment paper clearly labeled as such, waxed paper and butter paper are not suitable for air fryer use as they can burn up much easier.
The conclusion – baking paper in an air fryer
To sum it all up, you can safely use baking paper inside your air fryer, provided you don’t put it in the way of the internal air vents, and make sure the parchment doesn’t restrict the air flow which is vital to the air fryer’s correct operation. Positioning of the baking paper will differ from one air fryer to another because of slight design differences between different appliances.
Using parchment paper with your air fryer will give you quite a few benefits, especially when it comes to much easier cleanup after cooking. It’s also important to mention here, that using parchment paper is much easier in a larger air fryer, as you’ll have more space to put the paper in without obstructing the air flow inside the appliance. We hope we were able to answer your question! Until next time!
