My first air fryer roast potatoes turned out better than I expected! This was my main reason to buy an air fryer – to be able to make roast potatoes and roast parsnips quickly and easily for my next Christmas Dinner.

Using a mini oven, I’d found they were just too long winded to produce roast potatoes that weren’t really worth waiting for! I’d tried some frozen roast potatoes one year – and last year I’d even resorted to buying them from Toby Carvery. I was determined to make my own, using an air fryer. But would they be better? Or would the air fryer turn out to be an expensive waste of space?

My air fryer potatoes turned out brilliantly! Of course, the first few times you make anything it’s a bit of a learning curve to tweak your method/timings to get them just how you like. I used cheap supermarket potatoes.

Crispy on the Outside; Fluffy in the Middle

The overall texture was better than I’d expected. My roast potatoes cooked in the air fryer did have a crispy outside and a fluffy middle. Here’s what I did!

• I peeled the potatoes and cut them to size, putting them in a bowl of water for 10 minutes or so.
• Next, I emptied the water, adding just a big splash of water at the bottom of the bowl and put a loose lid on top. The lid was to keep a lot of the heat in so the potatoes would “steam”. I microwaved them on high power for 3 minutes, turned, 3 minutes, turned. They were then par-boiled by steaming!
• I drained the water off and tipped them into a dish large enough for them to lay in a single layer and let them cool off. It’s optional to “fluff” the potatoes at this point if you wish. I usually don’t do that as it means getting the colander out and creating another item to wash up…
• Once cooled, I splashed some oil onto the potatoes and turned them over, so they were fully coated.
• I tipped the potatoes into the air fryer, set the temperature to 180C and air fried the potatoes for 10 minutes. They were browning nicely, but needed turning. I turned them over and air fried the roasting potatoes for a further 5-6 minutes; I then turned them again and set the timer for another 5-6 minutes.

And that was it! Great, evenly browned, roast potatoes; crispy on the outside and fluffy in the middle.