Halogen Oven Vs Airfryer | How Do They Differ?
In the era of the Covid-19 pandemic, a majority of people have considerably become more health-conscious than they used to be, and ordering food has become a thing of the past. With the rise in popularity of home cooking, the market has also improvised its kitchen appliances in several ways. Out of which, low-fat air fryers and halogen ovens are among the most trendy and efficient kitchen equipment in the market today.
Customers who want a healthy lifestyle are more likely to buy one of these appliances, as they can cook meals with minimal oil consumption. Now, if you’re thinking about the differences between the two and superior to the other in terms of price, features, technology, etc. Here’s a comparison to dispel any questions and assist you in making an informed decision.
What Is An Air Fryer?
An air fryer can be explained as a supercharged miniature version of an oven that works with a heating element in conjunction with a powerful fan. The fan serves to circulate the hot hair coming from the heating element that results in the proper cooking of your food. As the circulation of extremely hot air cooks the meal, the term “air fryer” was coined.
The Air Fryer is quite compact in size and volume because the food must be kept closer to the heat to get fried and crispy. Unlike traditional deep frying, this equipment fries the food with minimal to no oil. Despite being different from a convection microwave, an air fryer needs to be preheated to your desired temperature, just like you would when using a convection microwave.
The metal frying rack on which you set your food is the only detachable part of an Air Fryer. Irrespective of the brands, all air fryers work the same way by utilizing a coil and a fan. The principle behind its working is the heat is transferred between your food’s warm and cool molecules, effectively circulating the heat within your meal.
What Is An Air Fryer Used For?
When you buy the best air fryer in India, they can be used for the following:
1. You may utilize your air fryer to produce customized dishes/recipes from scratch rather than just reheating the same old convenience foods.
2. The dishes don’t need to be breaded with an air fryer. In addition, it cooks the dishes at an ideal temperature, ensuring that they are soft and juicy when ready to eat.
3. You can also cook vegetables such as green beans, broccoli, baked potatoes, asparagus, and mushrooms, etc., in an air fryer, and that too in less than 10 minutes.
4. You can also cook dishes such as Ulli Vada and Paneer Kathi Rolls that are usually deep fried in an air fryer without the added disadvantages of excess oil.
5. Another advantage of having air fryers is that they can adequately prepare foods that benefit from partial crisping and dehydration. For example, eggplant and okra are delights that will become soft but not mushy on the inside and crispy on the outside when fried in an air fryer.
5. You may apply an easy technique to cook similar foods (like onion rings) in an air fryer by freezing them for around 10 minutes. This prevents the batter from dripping into your air fryer.
What Is A Halogen Oven?
The working of a halogen oven involves the 3 most essential factors, i.e., halogen lightbulb, radiation, and infrared energy. The principle behind a halogen oven is that the halogen bulb releases infrared heat when the bulb is on. The infrared heat released from the bulb ultimately cooks the food that has been placed in the halogen fryer.
Halogen Ovens offer additional room for larger quantities of food. The appliance is available in capacities ranging from 5 to 15 liters. Roasted foods work best with a halogen oven. Halogen Light Ovens, unlike the Air Fryers, do not demand preheating before actually cooking. This is because the equipment immediately heats up once you switch it on. The cover and glass bowl are the only parts of the Halogen oven that can be removed.
One of the perks of a halogen oven is that you can see your food getting cooked as it contains a transparent glass bowl, giving you better control over the cooking process. The basic cooking methods involve convection and conduction that leads to heat loss because of the requirement of heat transfer. However, a halogen oven solves this problem because its cooking method consists of a radiation heating trick that makes the infrared radiations pass directly through the food molecules.
This results in the vibration of molecules and eventually the generation of heat. This implies that you’ll use less energy to cook the same quantity of food in a halogen oven than you would in a convection oven.
Halogen Oven Vs Air Fryer
After knowing about air fryers and halogen ovens and their respective uses, let’s move on to the most exciting portion of the blog, i.e., halogen oven vs air fryer.
1. Technology
In the case of a halogen oven, the halogen bulb plays the primary role in cooking food. The cooking environment inside a halogen oven is maintained by the lid’s motor fan that facilitates hot air circulation within the oven. Due to the presence of a glass bowl enclosing the food, you can watch the progress of the cooking stages quite easily from the outside.
The oven contains 2 timer switches on the lid, 1 temperature knob, and a few pre-set functions to cook easy recipes. Whereas an air fryer is smaller in size and volume as compared to a Halogen oven. This is because ‘frying’ requires the food to be nearer to the source of heat. As a result, it cooks food in a more concentrated hot environment. The browning of the food is aided even more by the use of a non-stick surface. Some models also include a rotating cooking pan for uniform cooking.
2. Size
An air fryer’s cooking capacity is often fairly limited. The largest air fryers have a capacity of about 13 quarts that can be attributed to the technological limitations of air frying. An air fryer must retain a highly strong heat source to produce the air-fried effect, which becomes problematic if the frying space is larger. This is why, earlier, air fryers were just 3 to 4 quarts in capacity. They’ve been able to overcome this problem in recent years.
However, it’s still a constraint for bigger families. If we talk about halogen ovens, it is a larger device than an air fryer. Halogen ovens exist in sizes as large as 19 quarts, and some versions even have extension rings to expand the capacity of the halogen oven even further. It’s easy to put a full chicken inside a halogen oven, but this is usually a tight squeeze for most air fryers!
3. User Friendly
A major advantage of halogen ovens over air fryers is that the glass bowl provides a greater view of the food cooking inside. If your air fryer has a cover, you’ll have to open it repeatedly to see how things are doing inside. However, both the appliances include digital or mechanical timers, which make it simpler to prepare meals with the help of pre-set functions. Both of them are quite convenient to use.
All you need to do is put your food in the oven/fryer, set the cooking time & temperature, and wait. Remove the lid from a halogen oven to stir the food; pull out the food tray from the air fryer to stir food.
4. Price
When it comes to the budget, halogen ovens are usually as costly as air fryers. The halogen ovens in India costs around ₹6000-₹10000. Whereas, on the other hand, an air fryer costs around ₹3500 to ₹10000. However, the pricing depends on the model, capacity, and features.
5. Energy Consumption
As the halogen ovens are bigger in terms of size and volume, they require more power to operate efficiently. This is totally the opposite in the case of air fryers. An air fryer saves over 80% of energy as compared to halogen ovens. Therefore, you need not worry about electricity bills while getting an air fryer for your home.
6. Moving Shelves
The older versions of halogen ovens do not feature a rotating paddle, unlike modern-day halogen ovens. This becomes inconvenient for the user to utilize it for making fries and chips. But in the case of air fryers, both old and modern versions come with these paddles that assure uniform and automatic frying. However, there are a few models that do not come with a rotating paddle at all. So, you have to be a bit more attentive to ensure that the model you are buying has the adequate feature.
7. Cleaning
Talking about cleaning, both of the appliances are easy to clean and are low-maintenance products. In the case of an air fryer, all you need to do is:
- Unplug the unit from the power source
- Wait for it to cool down
- Wipe down the outside of the unit
- For cleaning the tray/basket, remove the part and either clean it by yourself or put it in the dishwasher.
Cleaning a halogen oven is equally simple. You have to:
- Unplug the unit from the power source
- Remove the racks and glass bowl
- Either place these parts in your dishwasher or clean them by yourself
However, if your halogen oven features a built-in wash function:
- Allow your oven to cool down
- Fill up the unit with warm water up to 3/4th of the bowl.
- Place the racks at the bottom of the unit
- Put a few drops of liquid soap and start the wash cycle
Note: If you choose to wash the bowl manually or put it in the dishwasher, be extremely cautious because it becomes pretty slippery when wet, and there are chances that you might drop them.
Conclusion
By now, you must have gotten an idea about the benefits, drawbacks, and differences between the 2 kitchen appliances after going through our Halogen Oven Vs. Air Fryer article. Simultaneously, you can see that they have a lot in common. Both of these appliances are useful and efficient in preparing nutritious meals for you and your family in a short amount of time. Nonetheless, it all comes down to your personal choice (budget, quantity of food you cook, your family size, etc). You can’t go wrong either way. So, sit back, relax, make your decision, and enjoy the finest outcome the gadgets can provide.
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