3-Course Air Fryer Meal
Hello, readers! Hope you’re doing well!
Today, I thought I’d give myself a bit of a challenge, I will be making a 3-course meal using one of my favorite kitchen toys, the air fryer. The air fryer is a wonderful device that is able to cook food like a deep fryer, but requires a lot less oil and grease, and therefore a lot fewer calories.
This sort of thing with a 3-course air fryer meal is not new, it’s something I’ve seen on Tasty and a few other videos, but I wanted to do this my way and see if I can make a delicious meal.
Here are the rules.
The air fryer is the only source of heat that I can use, so the stove, oven, and even microwave are off-limits.
Anything cooked has to be done so in the air fryer.
I cannot use any other electric appliances other than the air fryer, with the exception of the fridge.
So, with air fryers, there are a few things that I must keep in mind.
Air frying is a pretty dry heat environment, you need to think of it like a small oven, so anything that needs a wet batter is out of the question.
Also, due to the fan located right behind the heating unit of the air fryer, water would simply be blown around, so boiling anything is not an option either, so I’m afraid there won’t be any pasta today. :(
Also-also, the air fryer does tend to give off a lot of heat like a convection oven, so I’ll need to keep timing and temperature control in mind.
However, if everything goes according to plan, I should be able to crank out a tasty meal.
Let’s do this!
Dessert: Biscotti
So, I am going to work backward and begin with my dessert. I am going to make some biscotti, which means twice baked in Italian as it’s a type of cookie that’s baked twice, once as a full log, then sliced and baked again.
It might not sound very glamorous, but they’ll have some poppy seeds, dried cranberries, orange zest, and white chocolate for a nice blend of flavors and textures. Plus my name is Scotty, so this seems like a natural thing for me to make.
To get started, I’m going to make the dough for my biscotti, and it’s a pretty simple cookie dough.
I’ve got some butter, but I realize that my butter is not as soft as I want it to be, normally I’d fix that by popping it into the microwave for 30 seconds, but I do not have that option, so I’m going to put it into the air fryer on a low temperature and let it get soft.
I didn’t close it entirely because I didn’t want the butter to melt too much. I also cut the butter into smaller pieces to get it to soften faster.
As you can see, the butter is very soft now, on the edge of melting but once the dough is mixed up it will all be okay.
To make the dough for the biscotti, I’ll begin by beating the of soft butter with brown sugar and a little bit of sugar to get it light, pale, and airy.
This process would be much quicker and easier with a hand mixer, but that is an electric appliance, so I’m going to have to do this with a whisk. I work out regularly, so this amount of manual labor isn’t new to me, but a mixer would’ve gotten the job done faster.
After a few minutes of beating, I then add and vanilla extract and whisk to combine.
Once I was happy with that, I then added flour, poppy seeds, baking powder and a pinch of salt.
Once that was almost combined, I then added chopped white chocolate, chopped dried cranberries, and the zest of one large orange. Once it was all mixed up, I shaped the dough into a long rectangle, almost like the shape of a pillow, before putting it into the fridge to chill for an hour.
This is the other reason why I wanted to do the dessert first, it’s because the dough for the biscotti needed to chill.
Appetizer: Ricotta and onion flatbread
For my appetizer, I’m going to make a simple flatbread with some caramelized onions, some truffled ricotta, and arugula, it should be like a pizza.
To get started, I will make the dough for the flatbread, and this dough could not be easier as it’s only 2 ingredients, Greek yogurt, and self-rising flour. self-rising flour has baking powder added to it, so it’s a great shortcut for a fast dough.
I just mix up the dough until it gets shaggy and mostly combined before kneading it on a floured surface to get it smooth and elastic, I then cover my dough and let it rest while I work on my onions.
Caramelizing Onions
So, I am going to attempt to caramelize onions in an air fryer. Usually, caramelizing onions involves a very low heat that’s meant to cook out the water in the onions and make them very soft and sweet.
I hope to accomplish this with the air fryer.
To get started, I sliced my onion as thin as possible, then tossed them with some salt to draw out the moisture, and put them directly on the bottom of my air fryer basket with the fryer set to 300 degrees. I made sure to check the onions every few minutes to make sure they weren’t burning.
Truffled Ricotta Spread
While the onions were doing their thing, I made a quick spread for my flatbread. I just mixed together some ricotta cheese, chives, a bit of truffle oil, and truffle salt for a nice earthy flavor. I set that in the fridge so the flavors can develop while I finish my flatbread.
Usually, I think truffle oil is a bit of a gimmick in cooking as it often doesn’t even contain real truffles, but I thought that the flavor would be nice to lift up the onions and the arugula that I plan on putting on top.
I do know that truffle oil has a very strong flavor, so I just added a few drops at a time until I was happy with the flavor.
After about 20 minutes, I took the onions out and had to say that I was very pleased with the color; they were golden and beautiful. I noticed they got a bit crispy from the air fryer, but I am not mad at that.
I put those onions aside while I moved on to cooking my flatbread.
Cooking the flatbread
For this, I turned my air fryer up to 400 as I wanted the flatbread to brown and cook quickly while I roll out half of my dough to make it very thin.
I rub my dough with olive oil then lay it onto this little rack that came with the air fryer and lower that in. I cook the flatbread for about 2-3 minutes on each side until both sides were beautifully golden.
After letting the flatbread cool for a moment, I then spread on the truffled ricotta spread, and topped it with the beautiful onions, some arugula, and a drizzle of balsamic glaze.
Yes, I used a pre-made glaze, but there was no realistic way I could’ve made balsamic glaze in the air fryer without getting vinegar all over the inside.
Back to the biscotti
The dough for my biscotti was very firm, so I decided it was time to get that cooking.
I turn the fryer down to 325 degrees, lay my biscotti dough inside, and let that cook. I wasn’t sure how long it was going to take, so I just kept my eye on it.
After about 20 minutes, I noticed that the outside was getting quite brown but the inside was still raw, however, this is what you want with the first bake for biscotti as once I let it cool for a bit I’ll slice it and bake it some more.
I let that cool while I worked on my entree.
Entrée: Crusted rack of lamb
For my entree, I’m doing a breadcrumb-crusted rack of lamb with some blistered tomatoes, asparagus, and an herb sauce. I love lamb, I feel like it’s a protein that people should eat more.
I’ve had my rack of lamb sitting out at room temp so it’ll be warmer by the time I go to cook it.
Normally when I do this, I sear the lamb in a pan before applying the crust, but I was afraid that might lead to me overcooking the lamb in the air fryer, so I decided to skip that step entirely and see if I can still get flavorful lamb in the end.
After seasoning the lamb, I then brush the outside with Dijon mustard before rolling it in my coating, which I made with breadcrumbs, salt, pepper, garlic powder, and a bit of olive oil.
Once the lamb was nice and coated, I crank the air fryer back up to 400 degrees as I want the breadcrumbs to get crispy but I still want the lamb to be medium-rare. I get my lamb in and let that cook.
Herb sauce
While the lamb cooks, I moved on to a simple herb sauce, an Italian spin on a classic chimichurri.
Chimichurri is normally made with cilantro, fresh oregano, mint, and some other things to make it into a nice sauce, but I’m giving it an Italian twist and hopefully, it’ll help cut through the richness of the lamb.
Normally, I’d make chimichurri in a food processor, but that was not an option today so I’m going to use a mortar and pestle. A mortar and pestle is a tool, but it is not electric so it does not break any rules here.
All I did was bash up some chopped parsley, basil, dried oregano, chili flakes, garlic, and a touch of salt to form a paste before adding some red wine vinegar and olive oil to make it more like a vinaigrette.
Look, if all else fails with the entree, at least I made this herb sauce.
Asparagus and tomatoes
After about 6 minutes, I saw that the breading on the lamb was beautifully golden, so I took it out and allowed the lamb to rest while I worked on my tomatoes and asparagus.
With the asparagus, I started by snapping off the woody ends before tossing it and some cherry tomatoes with olive oil and a touch of seasoning before popping them into the air fryer until the asparagus was tender and the tomatoes were blistered.
Once the veggies were beautiful, I just put them onto a plate with the lamb and a drizzle of the herb sauce.
I feel like there’s a nicer way to plate this, but I just did it the best I could.
Finish the Biscotti
The last thing I wanted to do was finish my biscotti.
I turn the air fryer down to 325 and used a serrated knife to carefully slice my biscotti log before laying them, sliced side down, onto the same rack used for the flatbread as I did not want to put the biscotti directly onto the basket where I just cooked lamb and asparagus!
I get my sliced biscotti back into the air fryer and let that go, hoping the biscotti got golden and firm.
Ok, so, I did let my biscotti get away from me a little bit and, as a result, it did get somewhat dark on me but…that’s ok…these things happen…I’m sure it’s still going to taste good.
And after all, is said and done, it’s time to taste everything!
Starting with the flatbread, I was very happy with the crispy texture and the thickness of the bread itself, the ricotta spread had the right amount of that truffle flavor, the onions has a nice amount of sweetness, and that peppery arugula helped to tie it all together!
For the entree, I was very happy with the cook on the lamb, the breading stayed on the lamb, which I was happy with, the asparagus was tender, the tomatoes were juicy, and that herb sauce gave some nice herbal/acidic flavors to make the dish complete.
As for my biscotti, although they were darker than I initially expected them to be, they didn’t taste burnt and was full of flavors and textures from the poppy seeds, the chocolate, and the cranberries.
I would make some of these items again, this was fabulous!
And if you have ideas for any other challenges you’d like me to take, then please let me know in the comments!
