Philips 1000 Series FlexDrawer Air Fryer

Introduction

The Philips 1000 Series FlexDrawer Dual Basket Air Fryer takes the powers of a traditional dual-zone air fryer and adds a little more flexibility.

As with dearer rivals such as the Ninja Foodi FlexDrawer Air Fryer 10.4L AF500UK and the Cosori Dual Blaze Twinfry 10 Litre Air Fryer, this air fryer has the option to remove the divider between the two baskets to create one big one that’s ideal for large batch cooking, or cooking longer food items that won’t fit in the confines of a smaller dual zone basket. 

At 7.1 litres in capacity, it is smaller than both Cosori and Ninja’s options, and strips back some of the more advanced functionality (such as top and bottom elements) and features to provide the core experience of a flexible drawer air fryer in a more affordable package. 

At £133.99 (although often discounted to the sub-£100 mark), it’s cheaper than its rivals, too, and if it can nail the basics, it may well be one of the best air fryers I’ve tested. Let’s take a closer look.

Design and Features

• Compact profile
• Easy control panel to use
• Reasonable functionality

This Philips FlexDrawer Dual Basket air fryer isn’t what I’d call ‘flashy’ in terms of its looks. It’s more of a generic air fryer, with a matted black plastic chassis and a glossy top panel for controls that can attract fingerprints even with infrequent handling. The actual footprint on a worktop, considering it’s a smaller dual-zone one, isn’t too bad, and it’s quite a compact unit against its larger rivals.

A 7.1 litre capacity is reasonable for moderate levels of family cooking, which can be split into two with the bundled divider to make individual baskets just over 3.5 litres each. There’s enough space in here across the two baskets for fair portions of meat and veg, or you can remove the divider with ease for cooking larger items, such as longer steaks or chips, for instance. 

The fact that this larger basket is in one piece makes it a little unwieldy to handle and wash up if you’ve got a smaller sink, as I have. It is nonetheless well-built, and the handles on each side are useful. The crisper plates here are of decent quality and easy to take out and put back in when needed, while the silicon divider is convenient for splitting the bigger basket into two separate zones.

As is typical with these cheaper air fryers, this Philips model has functions based on the type of food being cooked, rather than by method. There is a Reheat setting, although the other five functions correspond to Frozen Food, Meat, Poultry, Vegetables, and a Cake setting.

Tapping each function on the glossy control panel atop the unit spits out a preset time and temperature, which can then be adjusted by the temperature and time buttons on either side. It’s easy to do, although the fact that they’re on opposite sides to the way they’re shown on the unit is a small gripe I have. You can also select functions for each basket individually, or as one large instance, plus sync functions and time across both baskets and set a shake reminder.

The top temperature with this air fryer, regardless of function, is 200°C, which is fine, although a little unremarkable if you’re after extra crispy results. For instance, most of Ninja’s air fryers can go up to 240°C on Max Crisp mode for extra-crispy cooking, if you want it.

Once you’re done with the fryer basket and crisper plates, they can both be put in the dishwasher. I avoided this in my testing and instead chose to handwash them. Doing so is easy, and they were clean, dry and put back in a matter of minutes.

Performance

• Consistent, crispy results
• Lower top temperature isn’t much of an issue
• Removable divider is very helpful for cooking larger food

Over my couple of weeks with this Philips air fryer, I cooked a range of different foods to best gauge its performance. In general, I was impressed with its ability to get decently crispy results in a rather quick time for a more affordable unit.

My first test involved cooking some bacon on the air fryer’s Meat preset at the top 200°C temperature, which came out surprisingly crispy in just five minutes.

For a dual-basket test, I tried some chicken breasts on the Poultry preset, plus some breaded mushroom arancini and croquettes on the Meat setting on the other side. The chicken breasts were set to 180°C for 20 minutes, with the arancini and croquettes at 190°C for 12 minutes. The chicken came out well done and moist, with the breaded implements being rather crispy on the other side.

I then tested out the Veg setting with a combination of hasselback potatoes on one side and some carrots and broccoli on the other. The potatoes were put at 200°C, and the carrots and broccoli at 180°C, and both came out well in 15 minutes.

To try out more of a baking workload, I gave some garlic knots a go on the Cake preset, which were put in at 200°C and cooked in just ten minutes. After eight minutes, they were taken out and turned over so the underside could cook, as it hadn’t done too well up to that point.

I cooked some oven chips on the Frozen Food setting at 180°C for 15 minutes, which browned and crisped up surprisingly well against the time the packet suggested they would take in a conventional oven.

Surprisingly, the single large basket afforded by removing this air fryer’s divider came in very handy for cooking kale, as it otherwise wouldn’t fit in the smaller basket, given the length. It was salted and sprayed with olive oil at intervals while cooking and came out wonderfully crispy with more aldente stems after 15 minutes at 180°C.

My traditional test of sausages did well at 190°C in just 13 minutes, with toasty, well-browned results in a similar time to more expensive air fryers I’ve tested.

I also cooked some steak without the divider, which was cooked on the Meat preset in two stages. It was set at a temperature of 200°C for five minutes first to sear the outside to some degree, and put down to 175°C for a further fifteen minutes, resulting in steak that was pleasantly pink in the middle and very tender.

Should you buy it?

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