Ashes to Ashes: All hail the air fryer

It's a little embarrassing to admit, but I am a terrible cook. Though I feel it's more and more the norm for people my age to simply lack the ability to navigate the kitchen, not having the very basic life skill of being able to feed myself inspired me to consider learning how to cook.

The goal I set out for myself when I first moved to Iowa ended in a pretty disastrous first attempt. It included fry oil, a fire (naturally), alarms being sounded and me almost running into the hallway of my apartment and screaming for everyone to get out. Luckily, in the midst of all the chaos, some tiny functioning part of my mind remembered how to put out flames and the crisis was diverted (I still have soot on my ceiling from that incident though). My mom ordered and sent a fire extinguisher to me later that same week.

Anyway, that incident scared me off for a while but like the brave trooper I am, I got back on the horse and started a Hello Fresh subscription. This was another mistake. The true depths of my ineptitude was nicely displayed as I attempted to make the semi-complicated dishes the company sent to me - my pork tenderloin was tough and chewy and my chicken teriyaki rice bowl was a sad mess of sauces. It was a steep learning curve, one I jumped off after only three months because the stress of making the meals was greater than contending with my inability to really take care of myself.

Still, here are some valuable lessons I learned while cooking with Hello Fresh:

There is a difference between slicing and dicing.

You cannot zest citrus with a grater.

An adult should own a proper kitchen knife and more than one set of utensils.

REMEMBER TO PREHEAT THE OVEN!

Baking and roasting are also two different things.

You really should heed the warnings and use gloves when dealing with peppers.

Avoid multitasking while in the kitchen.

That is all to say, I was back to frozen TV dinners, precooked meals and ordering out for a while until recently when I got my tax return and decided to buy myself a boring but responsible adult gift. The options I considered included: a new laundry basket, a new set of pots and pans (why?), and an airfryer.

In the words of the great Gretchen Teske, an air fryer 'is a life-changer.” And it is! I can confirm the validity of that statement. Let me tell you about the magic of this contraption that has existed since 2005 (according to Wikipedia).

You put things in it, press a couple buttons, and depending on what you're cooking, things pop out nice and crispy in under 30 minutes. I've used it nearly every day since it arrived at my house just two weeks ago. I'm not joking when I say I think this thing is the answer to all my problems, both in and out of the kitchen. My mother is similarly impressed with the meals I am making for myself now, and without the heart-gripping fear that I will kill myself or others.

Everyone should buy an air fryer. I hope whoever manufactures these machines reads this column and gives me some sort of sponsorship deal. I will gladly pedal these things out like a used-car salesman with their second-hand vehicles on a dealership lot. I thought the biggest threat to me continuing my career in journalism was an opportunity to be a rap star. Turns out, it was just the air fryer.