Who doesn’t like to make their Sunday afternoon crispy, crunchy, and delicious? Well, everyone does and an air fryer is what you need for this very purpose. Air fryers are one of the most important kitchen appliances to cook something really quick, especially when you are craving for fried foods.
What you can do and the benefits you will get from an air fryer are countless. But picking the best air fryer under $200 can be a little tricky when the market is filled with tough competitors.
You are neither going too low nor too high, as far as the price is concerned. So, you have to compromise in some sections and still need to find out the best option available within that range. To make your task a lot easier we have figured out the right option for you and that is COSORI Air Fryer Max XL.
Here in this article, we will be giving you a comprehensive idea about this amazon best-selling air fryer including its key features, shortcomings, pros, and cons, along with necessary information.
Why is COSORI Air Fryer Max XL so special?
The first question that may pop up in your mind is why we chose COSORI Air Fryer Max XL over other available options within this price range? What is the specialty of this product? Well, you will get to know the answer in brief once we start talking about the exclusive features of this product.
Let’s talk about the design first- It is a premium-looking fryer. It is neither huge nor that tiny too. You will get three options while choosing the color- Black, Burgundy Red, and White. Design-wise, every one of them looks cool with a convenient display to show the functions.
As we were talking about the functions, let’s see what we are getting here. Once you start noticing the display, you will see that there are 13 cooking functions. Among them, 11 are quick-cooking functions to cook items like vegetables, meat, potatoes, and such. The other two functions are- Keep Warm and Preheat options.
An air fryer doesn’t require much oil as you need in some other cooking options. In some cases, you can even reduce oil usage up to 85% compared to usual deep-frying methods.
Coming with a basket size of 5.8 quarts, you can do a lot with this one fryer, like preparing a whole family meal at once. Cooking a meal for four to five people is not a problem at all. Additionally, you will get an original recipe book containing 100 amazing recipes. What more could you ask for within $200?
Key Features of COSORI Air Fryer Max XL
You may have got some decent idea about the specialty of this product from the above discussion. But this was just the tip of an iceberg. Now, let’s discuss the key features in detail so that you don’t miss any bits of information about this top-selling air fryer.
1. Huge capacity
One of the most common problems with air fryers is that they have little space to offer. You can barely cook anything for more than two or three people. You might have already wondered whether there is any spacious air fryer available on the market or not!
This air fryer from COSORI exactly serves this purpose. You will get a huge space of 5.8 quarts from this product. Sounds amazing, right? You can easily cook a meal for four or five people at only one go.
The huge-size basket can even hold a 5-pound chicken to fry it well. Therefore, no worries about cooking a big meal.
2. Uses less oil
One of the main purposes of an air fryer is to save oil. You can deep-fry pretty much any food item with very little oil or sometimes with no oil at all. Our pick also stands firm in this category.
COSORI Air Fryer Max XL saves up to 85% of the oil you might have used in a conventional deep-fry method. Yeah, it is a great deal while paying less than $200. In fact, you are just paying a few more than $100.
Besides, using less oil in your food will also make your food healthy enough. And this is a fact that has been proved scientifically. While other conventional deep-fried foods contain 17 grams of fat, food fried in the air fryer will contain only 4 to 6.
3. User friendly
Another remarkable feature of COSORI Air Fryer Max XL is its simple design, which is quite user-friendly. You won’t find it confusing or complex while using, even if you are a total beginner at using air fryers.
There are 13 functions in the display. Eleven of them are quick-cook features to cook vegetables, meat, and so on. The other two are Keep Warm and Preheat. You can also set the temperature and time of cooking so that you get exactly the same flavor and taste as you expect.
4. Shake reminder
Though this one may seem quite insignificant, it is a very important feature. To cook evenly, shaking or mixing the foods is an important task if you are cooking with an air fryer. COSORI Air Fryer Max XL will give you a reminder when it is the right time to shake the baskets.
If you do not shake even after the reminder, the fryer will give you another reminder after one minute.
Generally speaking, stacked-up foods usually need shaking to cook properly. You may forget to mix the food or do it at the wrong time. That is why a shake reminder is a must in an air fryer, and manufacturers didn’t compromise here.
5. Safe materials
Cleaning is a very crucial task every time you cook with an air fryer. But before you start cleaning, you have to know whether the build materials are safe enough to clean or not. Otherwise, you may damage the products eventually.
No worries. COSORI Air Fryer Max XL is a dishwasher-safe air fryer. You can easily put the baskets in a cleaning cycle and get the cleaning done.
6. Additional recipe book
You are having a cooking recipe book with an air fryer! I guess you may call it the most fascinating gift coming with the product. Not just a random show-piece book! This book contains 100 recipes that are created by the COSORI chefs. What more could you expect from an air fryer under $200?
Trying something new while cooking is always fun. And you can have the fun part almost 100 times with this COSORI Air Fryer Max XL, as the recipe book contains 100 original recipes.
7. Completely certified
Worried about the certifications? You should not. This air fryer from COSORI is ETL listed. That means this product complies with the national standards.
The power rating of the air fryer is 120V/1700W. It can also handle temperatures ranging from 170 degrees to 400 degrees Fahrenheit. (Applies to USA and Canada only)
If you want to know the product’s origin, the manufacturers proudly say that the Golden State is their products’ home.
Shortcomings of COSORI Air Fryer Max XL
Like every other product, COSORI Air Fryer Max XL has some drawbacks too. The part that makes us different from other blogs is that we are not skipping this part. Let’s see what is there to question your decision before buying this product.
1. Reliability
Reliability is the thing you can’t always get against money. You have to do some hard work and be passionate enough to become a reliable person to someone, the same goes with every product we use.
If you check up user reviews online, you will see most of them are about reliability. A good number of users couldn’t trust COSORI’s products even after having the option to have a replacement. Instead, they are getting a refund even though that is less than the amount spent.
Most of the time, people face this issue where the machine is underperforming after a while. It sometimes happens just after one month of usage and sometimes after a year.
After reading this, you will surely question yourself whether to buy this product or not. But we advise you not to decide yet. Please, read till the end.
2. Leaks steam
Yes, it does leak steam while cooking something. Although it looks like just an outcome of a regular machine, it can get you into some serious troubles. For instance, you won’t be able to tell the difference between a machinery fault with regular cooking if the machine leaks steam a lot.
For this reason, this is not a great thing to have at all. You have to consider the price range, though. You are saving almost half of a premium air fryer cost if you opt to go for this one. You have to compromise something, right?
3. Poor results
Some of the machines are reported not to provide desired results. The air fryer will just not work, regardless of the actions you do. You will not get well-cooked food if you get one of the faulty products, unfortunately.
The French fries coming out of the fryer won’t look good, the veggies won’t be roasted properly, and you may experience unevenly cooked meat too.
4. Some fryers do not turn on
You should also be concerned about this issue. Many users reported that their fryers stopped working altogether. Some even reported they could not turn on the fryer from the start or after just a while.
In most cases, you can replace the product or get a full refund as the turn-on issue occurs mainly at the primary stage. But this might create a bad impression if you are gifting it to one of your beloved people.
You surely don’t want the person to open up the fryer and ending up with an air fryer that doesn’t even turn on!
But, then again, most of these shortcomings we have mentioned here are rare cases. They don’t usually happen to everyone and except few drawbacks, this air fryer is actually a great deal within this price range.
Pros:
- User-friendly functions
- Uses less oil
- Has a big storage
- Safe build materials
- Additional recipe book
- Shake reminder
- ETL certification
Cons:
- Leaks steam
- Reliability issues
- Poor results in some cases
FAQ
1. What does an air fryer do?
The name pretty much says it all. You will deep fry foods with the help of hot air in an air fryer instead of submerging them into the oil. With the pressure and heat from the air, you will be able to deep fry the foods.
You will need very little oil to cook foods with an air fryer, which is almost 70%-80% less oil than traditional deep frying methods.
2. Is air-fried food healthy?
Definitely. As the air fryers use very little oil (up to 85% less oil) than the traditional methods, the food will be healthy to eat. A report shows that foods deep-fried with air fryers contain almost three times less fat than traditional deep-fried foods.
3. Are air fryers really worth it?
Yes, we think so. First of all, you are eating healthy foods. It is a big plus point you are getting from it. And secondly, it is a quick solution to cooking. If you do not like staying inside of the kitchen for a long time, air fryers are your things to go with.
4. Can you slow cook with an air fryer?
Yes. You can slow cook with an air fryer. Air fryers are not only built to cook foods quickly. You can also make a meal that requires slow cooking.
For this reason, cooking a whole roasted chicken or some mashed potatoes with garlic won’t be an issue at all.
5. What are the disadvantages of an air fryer?
The first one is, almost all the air fryers are small. You cannot cook for a crowd by any means with an air fryer. Secondly, air fryers are expensive if you compare them with deep fryers. To conclude, air fryers tend to be messy. You have to give the baskets a clean after every cook.
Final Thoughts
Before giving our verdict, let’s remind you of the COSORI Air Fryer Max XL price. You have to spend just over $100 to get your hands on one of these. You are getting some top-notch features in this air fryer that you can’t even expect from its other counterparts.
Apart from the steam leaking issue, every other shortcoming of the product can be a unit defect. If you are unfortunate and happen to get one of those defective units, no worries, you can replace and get the right working one easily. Considering all these above factors, COSORI Air Fryer Max XL can be considered as the best air fryer under $200 without a second thought.
