Is It Possible To Toast Bread In The Air Fryer?

When you're in the throes of a busy morning, getting ready for work or your kids ready for school (or both), one of the very worst things that can happen is your toaster breaks down. So what do you do if you were looking forward to two pieces of toast with butter and jam, but the appliance specifically for this job suddenly isn't working? Do you even need a toaster or can you air fry your bread instead?

As a matter of fact, you can toast your bread in the air fryer, and it might take even less time than your actual toaster would — certainly less time than pan-frying your toast. A good place to start is two pieces for about three minutes at 400 degrees Fahrenheit, no need to pre-heat the air fryer, but you can play around with the settings until you have achieved your perfect level of bread toastiness (then perfect your butter-spreading technique next).

One of the benefits, too, of using an air fryer to make toast is that the bigger your air fryer, the more toast you can make. So for example, if you have one that more closely resembles a toaster oven, with a large tray (and therefore more surface space), you can make a lot more toast at once than in your typical two-piece toaster.

If you're toasting bread, you might consider flipping it halfway through the cook time. It's not strictly necessary, as the perforations in your air fryer basket allow the heat to reach under the slices, but if you prefer more even toasting – that is, one side, the top side, isn't significantly darker than the other — it does help both sides achieve similar color. (If you don't want to flip your bread, you can actually put the butter on so that it melts while air frying.)

If you're more of a bagel or English muffin fan than regular slices of bread, no worries — you can also toast these foods in the air fryer, though you might want to adjust the time by adding a few minutes in order to achieve crispness with these thicker bread products. Because the bagels and English muffins tend to have a bit more heft to them, too, you don't have to worry about them flying around your air fryer like you might with super-light pieces of toast. (And if you do find that your bread slices are lifting into the air once the air fryer starts, you can weigh them down with a metal rack or a silicone insert.)