Catfish Out of Water

I am a big fan of air fryer sweet potato fries. It only takes about 15 minutes. And it's a lot easier and more contained than getting out a sheet pan and trying to make them in the oven or the hassle of a deep fryer! Which I have done at home with a portable fryer and do not recommend it. It's a bulky appliance that pets are attracted to. And truuuuuuuuuuust me, the very last thing that you want to deal with in the middle of the night is the dog knocking it over, drinking half of the oil, and vomiting it in your bed! (The dog and deep fryer are fine, although my comforter, sheets, and some laundry on the bed absolutely were not and all had to be trashed and replaced because you cannot get oil out of anything!!)

So, I'm a huge proponent of air fryer wedge fries. If you want a more in-depth article on the matter, I have an entire post on The Fundamentals of Air Fryer Wedge Fries. They're one of my favorite things to make after a long day at work or alongside a quick and easy meal. All that you really have to do is cut the fries, season, sprits with oil, and voila! Fries! I'll rotate mine halfway through and re-season. But this is mostly because I'm too lazy to roll them in oil and salt, so they need a coating on the underside halfway through.

Honestly, nothing could be easier than air fries. This is maybe half of the purpose of my air fryer. I'll use it to reheat some things like a microwave. But the ability to make fries alone makes the entire appliance worth it. And at a fraction of the guilt from deep fried!

Do You Need to Soak the Potatoes?

I do not soak mine. Like many things that I make in the air fryer? It's oftentimes much simpler than people make it out to be.

Air fryers, while similar to both an oven and a deep fryer, are not in fact either of them. I'd liken them maybe more to a microwave or toaster oven than anything else. This is because, unlike an oven or deep fryer, they heat incredibly rapidly. Air fryers reach full temperature in a matter of seconds and, thus, don't need to be pre-heated.

The things that you cook in them also aren't sitting in oil. When you deep fry French fries, soaking the potatoes in water, with maybe a splash of vinegar, first helps. This is because water and oil don't mix. It's the reaction between the water that has seeped into the potatoes that helps them crisp up when they hit the oil. That's why you get the quintessential sizzling reaction when you make fries this way.

With an air fryer, though, you're using so little oil that water-logging the fries doesn't really help. Even when you're baking fries in the oven, they're sitting in a pool of oil. This isn't possible in an air fryer, though. The fries sit in a basket and, the only oil involved, is what you can get to stick to them. I spray mine with a little refillable glass oil spritzer. Although you can also roll them in oil and spices to achieve a similar effect. Either way, though, you're never going to get the amount of oil needed to create the water/oil reaction.

This means that air fryer french fries will never be as crispy as deep fried fries. However, they are generally healthier because they do use less oil, you can use better oils (like olive oil, rather than shortening. Which, spoiler alert, is what a lot of restaurants use to deep fry in!), and they cook in a fraction of the time as other homemade fry recipes.

What Seasoning Do You Use for Air Fryer Sweet Potato Fries?

I'm particularly fond of adding a bit of salt, pepper, and cayenne pepper. If I'm feeling adventurous, maybe some cumin or mustard. Really, you can add whatever you want to the fries, though. It's incredibly easy to mix and match flavor profiles to your personal preference.

I also like to mix up what I dip sweet potato fries in. Oftentimes I'll add hot sauce and maybe even some cheese to the ketchup. Although they're also good dipped in things like Hummus, Avocado Dip, and Greek Yogurt Dip.

Gallery

The sauce on the side is just ketchup and hot sauce warmed up in the air fryer with cheese curds toasted on top. The little dish is heat safe up to that point, so I just tossed the entire thing into the air fryer for 2-3 minutes.

Variations of Air Fryer Sweet Potato Fries

A lot of the time I'll just make air fryer wedge fries for fun. A light snack after work when I don't want a whole meal. But the other occasion for fries is definitely burgers!