Could America's love affair with the French fry be hitting a rough patch? Inundated with press around obesity and nutrition, people seem to be getting the message -- and forgoing the fries. According to NPD Research Group, French fry consumption dropped by 10 percent last year, as restaurant patrons passed up the potatoes in favor of healthier fare, such as salads. The moment seems ripe for deep-fried alternatives.
Enter the T-Fal ActiFry, a European kitchen gadget that looks (as the Wired blogger Brad Moon pointed out) like the love child of a salad spinner and a deep fryer. Developed three years ago in France (bien sur!), the ActiFry requires merely one tablespoon of oil (make that oil "heart-healthy," as the nice lady in the ActiFry promo suggests) to fry up two pounds of fries. (Compare this to the two-liter bottle of oil you'd need for conventional deep-frying.) The machine spins the potatoes, dispersing the oil lightly and evenly, while using hot air as a heating element. And the ActiFry isn't just for potatoes -- the gadget comes with recipes for an array of deep-fried goodness. Surely this will revolutionize our relationship with deep-fried food! Less oil equals less fat! All hail! ...Right?
Maybe, maybe not. Blogger Charlie Sorrel, also at Wired, makes the argument that the mechanics of frying food are slightly counterintuitive -- more oil in the pan does not always mean more oil in your food. In fact, when food is dipped in very hot oil, "water inside vaporizes, creating an outward pressure and preventing the absorption of fat." In other words, properly cooked French fries are "virtually fat free," says Sorrel. (Caveat emptor: Fat free does not equal calorie free.) Meanwhile, insists Sorrel, because the ActiFry directs you to add cold oil to the potatoes, much of the oil soaks in -- making ActiFry fries fattier than the conventional version.
Not so fast, insists Michele Lupton, director of communications at ActiFry. "ActiFry has been tested with a lot of doctors with Europe," she told Slashfood, "and what they tell us is, when eating French fries [cooked in the ActiFry], you can save over two hundred calories and over ten grams of fat per serving over fast-food fries." Whoa. There's no data to compare ActiFries with regular home-cooked fries, Lupton explains, because there are too many variables to consider, but if you're facing the choice of fast-food fries or ActiFry fries, the research shows a pretty stark difference.
Questions about fat content aside, there are other draws to the ActiFry. Moon liked the child-friendliness of the gadget -- no horrific third-degree burns waiting to happen. And those among us who fry a lot of food, like this reviewer, may find the ease of cooking -- not to mention dishwasher-safe cleanup -- outweigh the somewhat hefty $300 price tag. The ActiFry hit the U.S. market last October, and according to Lupton, it's selling extremely well despite its limited distribution. Still, the jury's out on whether it'll put the FryDaddy out of a job anytime soon.