Can you really cook a chook in an air fryer?

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You’ve probably heard of an air fryer, but a multifunction air fryer oven is a little bit different. It’s a more sophisticated cooking appliance that gives you cooking options beyond tasty crunchy fries (though it does those too!)

A multifunction air fryer oven is a great choice if you have a kitchen with no installed oven, or with a cook top that’s of a type you don’t like to use for certain meals (for instance, electric instead of gas). You can cook almost anything in a multifunction air fryer oven – including a full rotisserie chicken.

A multifunction air fryer means lots of options

At first glance, a multifunction air fryer oven looks a bit like a fancy toaster oven, but it’s much more capable. For instance, the Germanica 28L unit we’re using here has seven main functions, including simple toasting, baking, grilling, and air frying.

But it also includes some more advanced tricks, including the aforementioned rotisserie mode, as well as a defrost (that actually works!) and a dehydration function for preserving fruit and veg.

This means in just one 28 litre capacity bench-top unit, you can make a slice of toast, fry up some fish and chips, baste a rack of lamb to perfection, or even bake a pizza – it comes with a pizza stone too.

In fact, it comes with all the bits and pieces you need, including fry basket, grill rack, that pizza stone, and the multiple-piece rotisserie set.

Using a multifunction air fryer oven like the Germanica 28L is almost as simple as using a microwave: You put in your food (using the relevant attachments or racks), close the door, select the option you want from the easy-to-read front panel, and press Start. The air fryer does the rest!

What’s air frying all about? 

Air frying is a simpler, faster, and healthier way to cook up a crispy delicious meal – and with a multifunction air fryer oven you can create more than just fried recipes too.

The air fryer has a small amount of oil in a reservoir, then uses extremely hot air fan-forced down from the top of the unit over your food, and circulated. When you use the Air Fry setting, you get food that’s crispy and tender, but with a multifunction air fryer, you can explore options to cook other kinds of food too.

Apart from the health benefits of using much less oil than deep-frying, an air fryer is also much safer than having a huge pot of hot oil on the stove or countertop. (It also radiates less heat and smell than a deep fryer, though during air frying the unit will be too hot to touch without an oven mitt.)

And because you can do multiple kinds of meal in your multifunction air fryer, it means you don’t need a separate deep fryer. You’ll get the same crispy results, and if you need to cook a frozen dinner every now and then, you can get much better results than trying to heat it up in a conventional oven.

After the meal is done, a multifunction air fryer oven is also much easier to clean and empty out. A convenient crumb tray stops bits and pieces scattering around the kitchen, and because it uses only a small amount of oil, you don’t need to deal with disposing of litres and litres of stinky used oil every time you feel like a plate of hot chips.

So how do I cook a rotisserie chicken in a multifunction air fryer oven?

We promised this was possible, and now we shall deliver! In fact, this might be the cleanest, simplest, and most convenient way to do your own supermarket-style rotisserie chicken at home. Certainly much easier than trying to get the rotation and temperature just right on a Hibachi or other charcoal grill!

Again, taking the Germanica 28L multifunction air fryer oven as our testbench, you simply gather the rotisserie parts, including the rod and the forks for each end.

Grab your chook (and remember to take off the plastic!) and slide the rod through. Then fix a fork in each end to secure the chicken on the rod – otherwise it will just slide so the heavy breast side is down all the time!

For an even roast, it’s best to tuck in the legs and the wings. Depending on how recalcitrant your chook is, you might need to tie it up with baking twine – it’s a good idea to wet this before you start just to make double-sure it won’t blacken and char during cooking.

The idea is to make the chicken as close to the shape of a football as possible.

Put the food tray at the very bottom of the multifunction air fryer oven to catch drips from the chicken. And here’s an air frying hack: Put some water in the food tray and as this evaporates during cooking, it will keep the chicken especially moist and delicious – but don’t worry, you’ll still get that crispy rotisserie-style skin. Close the door, and press the Rotisserie button on the front panel. The temperature is set, but you can select how long the chook cooks.

The rule is 25 minutes per kilogram. If you do a lot of roast chooks, you’ll notice this is quite a bit quicker than the 35-45 minutes per kilo that a conventional oven recommends. With the time dialled in, press Start. Then go off and relax with your favourite beverage while your perfect rotisserie chicken cooks!

Where a multifunction air fryer oven outperforms other ovens

Okay fine, maybe you have a super-fancy oven that can rotisserie a chicken and so this isn’t that amazing to you. Unless you ask yourself – can that same fancy oven also defrost and dehydrate food?

And we’re not talking that weird watery half-cooked microwave defrosting. Placing a frozen piece of meat on the food tray and pressing Defrost will see the multifunction air fryer oven evenly defrost the meat without cooking the edges.

Impressively, a multifunction air fryer oven like the Germanica 28L can dehydrate food. This is ideal for making fruit and veggie chips – you get fruit slices that are crisp and flavourful, rather than burned or soggy.

The Germanica 28L Multifunction Air Fryer Oven (AF28L) is available from 12 November for $99.99 at selected Coles Best Buys Stores until sold out. Learn more at Germanica.com.au