Lol. No I can’t.

A person from my past once made the claim.

“Lou, you can make food, you cannot cook”

This person was a knob, but they were on the money.

And it seems every personal trainer dude on the planet, including the one that cannot be named because he infuriates me so much, is now offering more content on food and less content on exercise. They make funny videos showing how easy it is to make a quick meal that hits all the macros. They season EVERYTHING with paprika. They have cook books available for download. No shade, I enjoy all the content. Especially this guy and this guy (but please be aware they talk about fat loss a lot.)

And at centre stage of all the cooking content is a double Ninja air fryer

Remember when air fryers first hit our shores? They were expensive. Then Kmart sold a cheaper version in three sizes and a stampede was created. I missed out several times and then on one fine day, I found a small size left alone on the shelf. I snapped it up thinking it was going to make all my problems go away.

Reader, it did no such thing.

It was a shit air fryer and I didn’t know how to use it so I gave it away to a smarter person via a buy and sell page. Everyone was still going on about how amazing they are, and I would scoff “no, they suck a lot”.

But then the Ninja air fryer presented itself, and then it doubled in size with two baskets. Wow!

First came the moms with their content on the Ninja Air Fryer. Then came the personal trainer dudes.

I remained a non believer.

Until last year I went to England and Ireland with my family to visit more of my family who live there.

My cousin Dean had one proudly sitting on his kitchen bench.

“This is entirely my favourite appliance” he said, or words to that effect at least.

My cousin is extremely influential, because when we got home from our big trip, we immediately went to Briscoes and bought one.

It is an undeniable life changer. Everyone who raved about it was correct. My cousin was very correct. It is without a shadow of doubt, my favourite appliance we have. Even over my coffee machine.

Look here at this perfectly cooked chook. The stab hole is from my thermometer after the paranoia set in about giving us all salmonella. But sure enough, cooked perfectly.

This chicken here was 35 minutes on air fry, then 5 minutes on max crisp to make it look the way it does.

Chicken - 35 minutes plus 5 for paranoia plus 5 for crisping
Sausages - 7 minutes
Nuggies - 16 minutes
Mini pizza on a pita bread - 6 minutes
Burger patty things (did require some turnung) but 15 minutes tops I think

See what I mean? So easy and quick, even I can do it. And I want to reiterate that my cooking skills are as good as a chocolate fish on a hot day. Insufferable cooking skills.

Here’s a link to a Ninja air fryer recipe website or you can try this one here but also you get a handy wee times and recipes book with your Ninja air fryer which for us lives permanently on the shelf above.

I do want to offer some advice here though.

This air fryer cooks chicken. It does not make a “roast chicken with trimmings” etc. If you’re planning on a big fancy roast, you’ll probably not use an air fryer, and more likely to use an oven like people who can cook very well do. But for us, it’s perfect to cook a chicken in, and then maybe use the other basket for some vege. Maybe. The other thing I want to mention is that at time of writing, Briscoes had these things priced at $499 and we got ours for $299. They are on sale all the time, make sure you are not paying anymore than $299. Other places have them for less, too.

Thanks for reading this newsletter. I really appreciate the time you give to me for this and I hope you get some value from it. If you have any questions you can reply directly to this email or if you’ve landed here from a link, email lou@sweatypals.nz. You can also follow me on Twitter here, and instagram here.

Lou xx