ORLANDO, Fla. (Ivanhoe Newswire) – Air fryers, rice cookers, instant pots and sous vides are the trendiest kitchen appliances on the market, with a combined average of 15 million purchases a year. They promote efficiency, trim time, and require less effort, but are they also healthy? Or are the traditional methods better?
Fried foods always have that crunchy, crispy, and tasty texture, but instead of cooking it in oil, what if you fried it in air? Air fryers definitely are the healthier choice than deep fryers. Not only does it cut around 80 percent of calories, but it also uses just one tablespoon of oil, compared to three cups for deep frying. That’s 50 times less oil.
Rice cookers are a fast, effortless option, compared to cooking it in a pot, but there aren’t any health differences between the two. Steamed rice is still a healthy carbohydrate.
Slow cookers are actually one of the healthiest ways to cook meat, since it’s being cooked over many hours, and there’s no unnecessary oil needed to keep it moist. The low heat and tightly confined space allows for nutrients and flavors to stay in the pot.
And if you’re still using a pressure cooker, unlike slow cookers, they cook in high heat over a faster period of time. While many nutrients, like vitamin C and folate, are lost in high heat, they are often left in the surrounding liquid. This is a plus for slow cookers, as many of those surrounding liquids are kept in the food.